Cargo Ship
"Gentlemen...behold! I have made love to this machine! And now, upon retrospect, I ask why?" —Dr. Weird (while gesturing to a lawnmower), Aqua Teen Hunger Force
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"Wow, Bender, are you and the ship an item? I mean, I know you're both items, but how can you date a ship anyway? It'd be like me dating a really fat lady, and living inside her, and she'd be all like: *makes airplane noises*" —Philip J. Fry, Love and Rocket
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Shipping where one or both of the partners is an inanimate object—becoming, in effect, a Companion Cube. A common type of Crack Pairing in fandom. To some, this kind of shipping is made of Squick; to others, it's Serious Business.
Semi-justifiable if the object in question is an Empathic Weapon.
Compare Robo Ship, when part of the pairing is a sentient machine. Also, compare Cargo Envy, where someone else wishes they were the object in question. See also Perverse Sexual Lust (which is the real person-to-fictional character version) and I Call It "Vera".
Not to confuse with Cargo Cult.
Important note: Only list very common and popular examples on this page. Also, though we've said it elsewhere, do not Pothole work titles, and do not add responses to what has already been written.
Advertising
- Scott×Toaster. Gotta love how Quiznos' is sticking with this campaign.
- Skittles: Blend the rainbow!
- 2012 Hyundai Sonata Hybrid: Baby, baby!
Allegory
- Liberty×Justice. Frequently seen in political cartoons.
Anime and Manga
- One Piece
- Zoro x His three swords
- Luffy x Hat
- Luffy x Meat
- Rhino-Hippo x Going Merry (End of Movie 5)
- Nami x Money
- Nami x Tangerines
- Full Metal Panic!:
- Sousuke x Weapons
- Chidori x Harisen to beat up Sousuke with.
- Bleach: Aizen x Teacup: totally Canon!
- Mazinger Z: A mind-screwing example, overlapping with Robo Ship. Minerva-X was a FemBot was programmed to be Mazinger-Z's Battle Couple. So she was in love with it. However, she ALSO was a Humongous Mecha, only unlike Mazinger she was sentient, had her own mind and could feel, think and act on her own. Action Girl Sayaka declaring only HER FemBot Aphrodite-A was Mazinger-Z's true Battle Couple did not help matters...
- A Mouse and a talking cheese in this independent short.
- There's a very scary amount of Gundam fanfiction and art involving Humongous Mecha humping each other—and they aren't even sentient like the Transformers.
- Far more disturbing than the Gundam-on-Gundam action, however, is the human-on-Gundam. (It exists in Wing and 00 fandoms, at least.)
- Oh, but what takes the cake has to be Graham "Flag F___er" Aker from Gundam 00. The man has to be the Launcher Of A Thousand Cargo Ships: his Flags from the first season, his Shin Musha Flags from the second season, Exia, the titular 00, Haro, Ptolomaius I and II...
- Setsuna is also paired with his Gundam Exia.
- The EVAs in Neon Genesis Evangelion, too. At least they're partially organic and intelligent.
- In the case of Shinji and Asuka, being shipped with their EVAs is actually incest. In case it wasn't wrong enough.
- Would that include Gendo×Unit-01? Because that's sort of canon...
- There is actually a fanfic about Gendo being caught masturbating in Unit-01's entry plug - by Shinji noticing the droplets of semen floating in the LCL during a synch test, nonetheless. Absolutely everyone in the cast knows immediately it was him and are squicked out by it.
- A couple of third and fourth options have been suggested in regards to Macross Frontier's Love Triangle, Alto×VF-25 and Alto×the sky respectively, though these were mainly suggested for laughs (we hope) it does kinda make sense in a very eerie way.
- And in the first Macross Frontier movie we now have Ranka cosplaying a VF-25. It even transforms between Battroid and Gerwalk modes (and the Gerwalk mode looks like Ranka doing the VF-25)...
- Ranka clearly knows what he likes.
- Along a similar vein, the YF-19 could be seen as one of Isamu's distractions from the Macross Plus Love Triangle.
- And in the first Macross Frontier movie we now have Ranka cosplaying a VF-25. It even transforms between Battroid and Gerwalk modes (and the Gerwalk mode looks like Ranka doing the VF-25)...
- As well as Zone of the Enders, but when you consider the resident Humongous Mechas' already phallic cockpits, perhaps it was just a logical step.
- Notable is the fact that the main mechas in the series all have AIs with female personalities, and all three of them become really close to their (male) pilots. The one exception being The 2nd Runner, where the pilot constantly teases the AI about her friendship with the pilot of the first game.
- There is a particularly pervasive pairing circulating the Bee Train fan community: Madlax/curtain. It was spawned by a single scene near the beginning of the series where the titular Action Girl sneaks into the apartment of her target and wraps herself in a curtain for no apparent reason, looking both adorably cute and damn hawt at the same time.
- These are officially named inanimate object ships in the Pokémon fandom:
- Celebishipping: Vicious The Iron Masked Marauder and a Time Flute. (This one even had an article on Bulbapedia for a while.)
- Computershipping: Ash's Pokedex and Shu's In-com;
- Hatshipping: Ash and his hats;
- Mikishipping: Any combination of James, Staryu and a Pokedex;
- Orbshipping: Ash and his Poke Balls;
- Piketshipping: Pikachu and his ketchup bottle, which sacrificed itself to save him from a Scyther's blade;
- Pokedexplzshipping: Ash and his Pokedex;
- Postcardshipping: Primeape and Ash's hat;
- Recolorshipping: Ash's Hoenn hat and Ash's Sinnoh hat;
- Snackshipping: Sub Sandwich and a Rice Ball;
- Swallowshipping: Neo the Whiscash and a Master Ball;
- Zukanshipping: The original Pokedex and the Hoenn Pokedex.
- ... And that doesn't count all the "Gary and his hand" ships.
- Technically unnamed, but amongst Pokémon Special readers you have N X Ferris Wheel.
- Another borderline example: Fullmetal Alchemist's Ed×Al in his suit of armour body, doubling as incestuous Cargo Ship.
- How about Ed x Automail Arm?
- That would be a date with Metallic Palms!
- Also, Winry×Wrench. It's been suggested.
- Al x Mei, which also doubles as a (minor) May–December Romance. Poor Al. This one's canon in the end, though May had the sense to start dating Al after he got his body back.
- Kimblee x Philosopher's Stone deserves mention.
- Roy x Rubber Glove and Hawkeye x Revolver... Armstrong x busts of himself.
- Sheska / Sciezka x Books
- How about Ed x Automail Arm?
- Code Geass:
- Nina×Table. Technically not canon, just spawned from a masturbation scene. And within fandom, the table is referred to as "Table-kun" (see Memetic Mutation).
- The folks at 4chan gave us a Schneizel×Kannon's hat fanfic. And no, see for yourself.
- C.C.×Cheese-kun. Doesn't help any that C.C. is one of the resident Ms Fanservices.
- C.C. × Pizza. Don't tell me that isn't canon.
- You could also make a strong case for Lloyd x Lancelot.
- Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha: Bardiche/Raising Heart. It's only fair; everyone else on that show gets shipped with someone. Plus, given that they happen to be intelligent Empathic Weapons whose owners are more or less canon, it is more probable than most of the choices here.
- Dominion Tank Police. Leona×Bonaparte (her tank) is almost canon, what with how much she obsesses over it. We also see her nearly humping a motorcycle in New Dominion Tank Police during a flashback showing her as a motorcycle cop prior to joining the tank police. Her partner even lampshades it, and Leona isn't afraid to admit it.
Leona: I can't help it. It's the feeling of cold metal. It makes me all tingly. |
- Her coworkers certainly seem to think that this is canon, after an incident where after spending the night as Buaku's prisoner, she ignores her partner/would-be boyfriend to embrace Bonaparte.
Preacher: Let us not lead to judgement, Dear Lord, but if it appeareth that my fellow policeperson haveth an unnatural affair with her tank, forgive her. Amen. |
- Patlabor: Noah×Alphonse. (Same voice actress as Dominion.)
- In Burn Up Excess (and W), Maya Jingu loves her firearms. In one episode of Excess in particular, she is shown laying down and holding a rifle at a firing range, stripped to her underwear and getting a lot of...satisfaction from pulling the trigger.
- There's a running gag in the Katekyo Hitman Reborn fandom involving Hibari/Namimori. And no, we don't mean the student body, we mean the school itself. Talk about taking school pride a step too far...
- In perhaps an odd case of Defeat Means Friendship, Yamamoto×Wall is rising in popularity.
- D.Gray-man:
- Allen Walker/his Innocence. Yes, there has been fanfic. There's also some Tyki Mikk/Timcanpy.
- The greatest love between man and sword is between Kanda x Mugen.
- After great deliberation, the non-Shippers of the Tsubasa/×××HOLiC fandom have concluded that there is only one true official pairing: Mokona/sake. Yuuko/beer is up for debate.
- From After War Gundam X: Tiffa and Double X Gundam in a very brief one-shot.
- JoJo's Bizarre Adventure
- There's at least one fanfic shipping Dio Brando and a steamroller.
- There's also Kakyoin/Cherry, which is practically canon...
- Death Note gives us:
- Ryuk×Apple. Don't take our word for it, see for yourself.
- Light×Death Note, [1] [dead link] (NSFW),[2] which is probably the most canon ship Light will get.
- Or Light×Potato Chip. (NSFW)
- L×Cake. There is an explicit picture floating around somewhere.
- There's also a L×Cake fanfic. No, you're not getting a link. It's for your own good.
- And now you are. Still, though, you probably shouldn't look.
- There's also a L×Cake fanfic. No, you're not getting a link. It's for your own good.
- There's a group on deviantART for a zebra-striped couch Mello owns, which has been nicknamed Zeb and is often seen paired with Mello by it's fans.
- There's a Manga called The Female Fridge about a refrigerator with a human mind who falls in love with her owner. When she finds out he has a girlfriend, she murders them both by falling over on them.
- So, in other words, they were Stuffed Under The Music Tropes/Fridge?
- Well, he was being callously cold to the poor fridge...
- You might say the authors Dropped A Fridge On Them.
- So, in other words, they were Stuffed Under The Music Tropes/Fridge?
- Zig zags all over the place in Ghost in the Shell, especially since it's almost impossible to tell an android from a fully flesh and blood human at times.
- Akikan mostly avoids this by applying Moe Anthropomorphism to its soda can girls, but Kakeru fully embodies this trope when he decides to flirt with a vending machine that has a female voice programmed in. Twice. And in episode 7 he makes out with a chair.
- Baccano!
- For a change, an entirely canon (Yes, in that way) cargo ship: Nice and explosives.
- And Rachel really loves trains, in a Freudian way. Due to her daddy issues. It makes sense in context.
- Ojamajo Doremi: There's Doremi×Steak; Pop×Dolly (when she still thought that Majorika was a doll) and Majorika×Hot Spring. The latter two would pretty much make a love triangle, since Dolly is Majorika.
- There's a small and recent meme within the Axis Powers Hetalia Fandom about Austria and his piano...
- And fanart exists for the England×America×Hamburger love triangle.
- Not to mention the brief explosion of affection for Switzerland and his gun after the anime song preview.
- Also there are some fics of Sweden×Ikea. Ironically, these fics tend not to fall victim to IKEA Erotica.
- Recently, there's France×Gazebo fic/art.
- Somehow, this Refridgerator×Iceland×Refridgerator fic (Warning! NSFW!) hasn't been put here yet.
- Russia×his faucet pipe.
- Russia×Vodka..... anyone??
- There is a short (as in one paragraph) fic about Sealand×Waffle.
- Germany×Herr Schtick.
- "Mein Schticky Friend!"
- Flying Mint BunnyxHerr Schtick forever!
- There's a Record of Lodoss War fan comic shipping Deedlit×sword. In the Stinger at the end, she asks to borrow Ashram's sword, on the grounds that it vibrates.
- Nasuverse:
- Shiki×Chair is quite popular, then there's Shiki×Glasses, and Shiki×Nanatsu-Yoru (his knife).
- Hisui×any knife or sword.
- Ciel×Curry and Kotomine×Mapo Tofu.
- Shirou×any sword. Shirou×Caliburn is practically canon in the Fate route, the way he gushes over it.
- Rule Breaker×Azoth in a Seme×Uke relationship.
- Archer×Kansho×Bakuya for hot threesome action.
- Gilgamesh×Chains of Heaven kinda of canon when you think about it.
- K-On!
- Yu-Gi-Oh
- There's one Fanfic with a perfect example of this: Kaiba and his ego.
- Mako×The Ocean? I mean come on, that's got to be canon.
- There's actually a canon example, too. Seto is definitely very attached to his Blue Eyes White Dragon. It turns out that the original Blue Eyes was created from the spirit of his past life's murdered girlfriend.
- Mahou Sensei Negima: Natsumi×Leek.
- A surprisingly good Descendants of Darkness Fanfic ships Muraki, Oriya, and Oriya's katana. They used the handle, not the blade.
- Higurashi no Naku Koro ni: Rena×"Kenta-kun". Oookaaaay...
- Also similar to the Umineko example, Chie×Curry. It's one of the more popular pairings in Japan, at least it was before the anime was released.
- Gunsmith Cats: Rally Vincent×CZ75. Thankfully not loaded, but she certainly violated the first rule of firearm safety.
- Macademi Wasshoi: Trincia×Rocket. And it's CANON.
- Then there's one crossover between Tenchi Muyo! and Star Wars, about someone Ryoko and Ryo-ohki met in their early travels. The Millennium Falcon. Although at least it was Ryo-Ohki's love interest.
- Actually implicitly done in-universe with Sentou Yousei Yukikaze. The main character, Fukai Rei, only displays emotion with regard to his CO, Jack Bukhar, and his aircraft's AI, the eponymous Yukikaze. All the episodes basically tells us that the AI depended on Rei as much as Rei depended on her. This includes Rei distrusting the aircraft enough to have a breakdown in mid-battle (which only words of encouragement from Rei finally make Yukikaze recover), the aircraft forcibly pulling Rei out of a soon-to-be-blown Flying Aircraft Carrier, to Rei trusting his aircraft even when she is about to commit suicide (which she finally didn't, simply because Rei is onboard). Even a psychologist actually concludes, in-universe, that Yukikaze has a measurable emotion much like a human, despite the AI looking nothing remotely like human, and the only sound we hear from her is when she executes a command, or when her camera (pointing to Rei, no less) focuses and refocuses, as if someone nodding/shaking her head.
- The next best thing to Word of God, the designer himself said Yukikaze was a series where the eponymous jet was the heroine.
- Golden Boy gives us the lovely canonical relationship between a Rich Bitch and her motorbike, one that she straddles naked over and masturbates with until Kintaro beats her in a downhill bike race.
- Canonical in Transformers: Robots in Disguise: Sideburn is always hitting on sexy red sport cars.
- His Super Mode makes him a red sports car. This is best not thought about.
- Eureka Seven has the canonical Renton, Eureka, Nirvasch love triangle.
- Debatable, as the Nirvasch, while mecha like in nature, DOES turn out to be a sentient, living being born by the Coral. Note also the many references to LFOs dying in the mine sequence.
- Sometimes it seems that Vice-principal Uchiyamada in Great Teacher Onizuka loves his car more than he loves his family. The way he gushes over it—complete with kissy faces, caressing, and blushing—makes one wonder whether he'd have preferred to marry it rather than his emotionally cold wife.
- Idolmaster: Xenoglossia completely runs with it: the only way to pilot the giant robots is to treat them like a boyfriend. Of course, the robots themselves are sentient, so there was one case of a giant robot recording a video of Haruka telling the robot that she wants to "show him everything", and then taking her shirt off.
- Saw a fanfic of Kyuubi no Kitsune×Hokage Tower. And yes, it was indeed as disturbing as it sounds.
- Here it is for anyone interested.
- Gaara×Gourd... anyone?
- Gaara/Gourd, Temari/Fan, Kankuro/Puppets... It runs in the family.
- Kisame x Samehada. He wasn't too happy when it basically cheated on him with Killer Bee.
- Umineko no Naku Koro ni: Kumasawa×Mackerel. Popular enough that it's frequently seen on the popularity polls for favorite couples.
- Erika x chopsticks x duct tape.
- Durarara!!: There is growing support among the fandom for Shizuo×"Vending Machine-chan".
- The series also has something of a canon Cargo Ship in that Anri's Empathic Weapon, Saika, has a bizarre romantic attachment to Shizuo. Anri has trouble focusing around him simply because the sword gets terribly...excited whenever she so much as looks at him.
- I believe Celty/Celty's Bike deserves some special mention as well.
- The author, Narita, has proven to be thoroughly amused by the concept of shipping inanimate objects, given some of the things Erika and Walker say. They once argued over who'd top in a Fans/Trolls ship.
Erika: Speaking of which, there had been a shitstorm just recently about which one is the OTP between CD x DVD or DVD x CD... |
- There's also Kida×Hoodie.
- Kino from Kino's Journey is often shipped with her talking motorcycle Hermes; not surprising since he is Kino's only companion, and the only sentient being she feels a real bond to.
- Speed Grapher. I mean, seriously. It’s not only canon but a major plot point that Saiga has a fetish for his camera. And Ginza has a fetish for her gun. That’s not to mention all of the villains. There’s a woman with a fetish for diamonds, a dentist who just loves teeth, a guy who simply adores tattoos, a guy who loves music, and one who likes food. This is all completely canon.
- In one episode of Sonic X, while aboard a cruise ship and going insane, Sonic gets Tails worked up about the X-Torando being lonely.
- Saitama Chainsaw Shoujo: Fumio and her chainsaw. Even the Doomguy never had this much love for his Weapon of Choice.
- In Sora no Manimani, Cloud Cuckoo Landers Kawamura and Minami have a fetish for constellations.
- Mushishi. In one case a girl gets... rather attached to a particular swamp. In another episode, a woman begins to visit a white bamboo tree when she and her husband are unable to conceive. She even gets pregnant from said relationship with bamboo tree. The circumstances surrounding both of them are odd, but I believe that it qualifies for this trope.
- And then in Samurai 7, there's Kikuchiyo and Kamachi—which, like the Al×Mei ship above, also doubles as May–December Romance. Assuming he really isn't thirteen, of course.
- The World God Only Knows gives us Keima×Dating Sim heroine Yokkyun and Elsie×fire trucks.
- Soul Eater gives us Marie Mjolnir, who sees herself as such a Christmas Cake she plans to marry a toilet on the grounds that "It will accept anything she gives it". It's a very classy series.
- Himawari! presents us with a dual, canon one in the form of Cherry Tree×Chimney. Granted, it's the kami (god) of the tree that's in love with the chimney, but still.
- The Title Sequence of School Rumble shows a sequence of unrequited loves, ending with Oji being in love with curry. (Who the curry is in love with is left a mystery.)
- Dragon Ball's canon pairing of Krillin and Android 18. 18's at least half synthetic, so this Troper thinks it counts.
- She was still human enough to mother Maron, though.
- Farnese×Dragonslayer
- Guts x Dragonslayer, including many Does This Remind You of Anything? moments.
- In Tiger and Bunny, the superheroes collectively decided to give Barnaby "Bunny" Brooks Jr. a stuffed rabbit for his birthday. The fandom has since shipped said rabbit with both Barnaby and Kotetsu, usually as a surrogate for the other half of the duo.
- The HeroTV Fan Book 2 confirms what everyone already knew: Agnes Joubert loves ratings.
- Jun of Rozen Maiden is often shipped with any dolls in the series, especially Shinku. Although, as these dolls are alchemically animated doll and thus has a soul, albeit an artificial one, it may also be said as Robo Ship.
- Considering that most of the girls in Cubex Cursedx Curious are inanimate cursed objects, you do the math...
Comic Books
- There is probably a decent chunk of fanfic dedicated to shipping Sara Pezzini (or another wielder) with the Witchblade. Then again, the Witchblade being a pseudo living/sentient object, it might not count.
- Tony Stark/his sentient Iron Man armor. Note that this was Canon, complete with the jealous armor demanding that Tony "get inside me". The armor even gained the fan nickname "Tony's abusive boyfriend".
- While not nearly as popular as the above, there is also Tony/Cheeseburger based on a scene from The Movie.
- Marvel Comics' 1970s character Starlord actually had a few plots based on his relationship with his sentient, shapeshifting Ship. (She's actually an Energy Being in Cool Ship form, making it more an Interspecies Romance.)
- Runaways: There's at least one Victor×Toaster fanfic.
- Archie Comics Sonic the Hedgehog gives us Bean the Dynamite, a duck who's really fond of his bombs...
- Part of the Canon and played for creepy in the V for Vendetta comic, between the Head, Adam Susan, and the computer Fate. It's strongly implied that Susan is a heavily-closeted, self-loathing homosexual and this is his coping mechanism. Discovering that V has been manipulating Fate since the beginning sends him into a Villainous Breakdown which eventually leads to his assassination.
- Tank Girl and her tank. Not only are they stated to have had sex (just that one time, and she was drunk) but she got pregnant and bore its half-human, half-armoured fighting vehicle offspring.
- Superman: "Where is she? My lady the sun. She makes me strong. She gives me her light and her life and I am forever grateful. But where is she now?"
- Lois has also teased Clark by comparing the city of Metropolis to his mistress.
- Batman and Gotham. At one point, it's mentioned that he's already married - to the city.
- There is many a fan art of Jason Todd being shipped with bread due to a panel of him robbing a bakery after his resurrection.
- Canonical in Comic Book/Hellboy spin-off BPRD: Roger the homunculus falls in love with (a statue of) the Roman goddess Cloacina after a mission in Venice, and goes to have a picnic lunch and wine "with" her. When he is destroyed and trapped in a fantasy realm in his own mind, he imagines the statue of Cloacina there with him.
- The 1 shot comic involving Doom loosely based on an unnamed Marine just killing demons has the marine come across the BFG and literally weep tears of happiness because it's so powerful it moves him.
- As if the relationships in Krazy Kat weren't konfusing enough already, there are plenty of hints of Ignatz × Bricks.
Fan Works
- Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Abridged Series: "Oh, Black Luster Soldier, no one must ever know of our forbidden love..."
- "Oh giant rock, sometimes I think you're the only one who understands me". Never mind Kaiba, I think Ishtar is the one who needs to get laid.
- Mako and the Ocean. He later breaks up with the sea for the younger aquarium, which 'has its benefits'. He then reunites with the Ocean with Britney Spears music playing in the background.
- "What's that Dark Magician Girl? You wanna make out?"
- Kaiba seems to have a raging hard-on for the entire children's card game.
- He reserves his strongest feelings for his Blue-Eyed White Dragons, however.
- And the God Cards; "summonitsummonitsummonitsummonitsummonitsummonitsummonitsummonitsummonit..."
- Yusei and his D-Wheel which he refers to as his girlfriend.
- Princess Tutu Abridged: "Mytho's being paired with the river!"
- Most Vocaloid pairings that aren't with each other involves their Trademark Favorite Food - Kaito×Ice Cream, Len×Banana, Miku×Leek, and Gakupo×Eggplant are the most common. And there are some examples of Rin×Steam Roller. Kaito also gets some Kaito×Scarf among his fans.
- Naruto the Abridged Series: Kakashi and a carton of Milk. Appears to be canon.
- Is this troper the only one who sees some major Foe Yay between Sasuke and the log?
- Harry Potter:
- There's quite an infamous Fanfic with Ron shagging a teapot. And another with a teaspoon.
- The "Squidwarts" shipping (Giant Squid/Hogwarts Castle) is something of a meme on Fandom Wank.
- Harry×Gringotts×Hogwarts. Here, for the curious.
- Draco×goblet, which comes from a line in the first book after the Slytherins supposedly won the House Cup, "A storm of cheering and stamping broke out from the Slytherin table. Harry could see Draco Malfoy banging his goblet on the table. It was a sickening sight." Obvious intentional misinterpretation of "banging" produced the pairing.
- Also the Weasleys' Ford Anglia×Crowley's old Bentley from Good Omens. And the Ford Anglia×The Whomping Willow. That car gets around...
- Ford Anglia×Sirius's flying motorbike. The car is a playa.
- The Wizard Rock band The Whomping Willows have a few songs about the one-sided love between the Willow and Hermione.
- Harry Potter x Snitch. My only OTP. Come on, he came with him to the wedding, and he snogs it more than he ever snogged Ginny.
- Lucius Malfoy×The Cane. Yeah, Sneaky is the dominant one. And their love child is Sephiroth.
- Brilliantly depicted here (Completely Safe for Work).
- And of course, A Very Potter Musical gave us the Sorting Hat and the Scarf of Sexual Preference...
- And Tumblr gave us Drapple, which is Draco×Apple.
- Invader Zim: One fanfic depicted GIR's total and complete love for... a toaster. I squeaked.
- And there's one where, while Zim and Dib are busy fighting, Zim's computer and Tak's ship (which now belongs to Dib, remember) start flirting with each other. By the time Zim and Dib reenter the room, the computer and the ship are having what could best be described as robot sex.
- In early episodes of Touhou fan video Komeiji Koishi No Dokidoki Daibouken, Koishi seems to share a fairly close bond with her 'Hat-san'. She also takes advice from it.
- In episode 6, it turns out that there are more than one 'Hat-san'... To be precise, a wall full of Hat-sans. Looks like she keeps them as a replacement, though.
- 'Hat-san' is probably the identity rather than the physical object itself; as long as it is wearable on her head, whether the said object is the same hat she usually wears, or even an actual hat, doesn't seem to matter. She manages to replace the hat with her shoe, call it 'Hat-san' and have a conversation with it in usual manner after losing the original Hat-san in episode 5.
- In episode 6, it turns out that there are more than one 'Hat-san'... To be precise, a wall full of Hat-sans. Looks like she keeps them as a replacement, though.
- The Legacy of Kain fandom is peppered with Kain and Raziel slash after Raziel becomes the Soul Reaver.
- The scientist Feldspar and Master Chief's helmet in Company 0051. Chief himself is not amused.
- Axis Powers Hetalia: One fanfic gives us Iceland x Sweden's Fridge.
- Young Justice Abridged has Robin x The Justice League Computer.
- The Hunter x his BFS Blackfire in With Strings Attached. The four are disgusted when he constantly fondles the hilt and croons to the blade, which they quite rightly dub “masturbation.” Later, when he has made a Heel Face Turn and is trying to behave better but still unthinkingly fondles the hilt, John tells him to quit wanking off in public.
- Blackfire is actually a female demon bound in the shape of a sword; the Hunter is horrified to discover this.
- In THEPETEPETERSONEXPERIENCE, there is Murray having sex with his van in the fanfiction, "Murry the Robot".
Films -- Animation
- Pixar loves this trope:
- One of the first Pixar shorts was "Knick Knack", in which a plastic snowman trapped in a snowglobe tries hopelessly to access chicks who live in snowglobes on the shelves near him.
- The Toy Story franchise has quite a few literal Toy Ships in both canon and fanon. Fanon also likes to play Woody's relationship with his human owner, Andy, for Ho Yay.
- The characters being vehicles in the Pixar movie Cars, every possible ship is Cargo Ship by default.
- Robot×robot romance is almost the entire point of WALL-E. (And Green Aesop.)
- "Baby" Brent×Ceremonial Scissors in Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. He keeps them tucked in the back of his pants, plays them like an air guitar, clutches them when worried, and they have to be forcibly ripped from his arms for someone else to use them. Clearly it's love.
- Ray, in The Princess and the Frog, is a firefly who has fallen in love with a literal star.
- The "saber-toothed squirrel" Scrat and his acorn in the Ice Age movies. Only subtly implied in the first two movies, but anviliciously lampshaded throughout the third, to the point where after Scrat falls in love with another squirrel, there is an entire Sad Times Montage from the acorn's perspective. Don't feel too bad for it, though -- Scrat leaves the girl squirrel for the acorn in the end.
- It's worth noting that the Scrat/Acorn 'ship was a seriously bad case of No Accounting for Taste. The Acorn is possibly the most abusive Jerkass Love Interest in animated film history, always dangling just out of Scrat's reach and heaping abuse on him. The Tragedy here is that by leaving Scratte he has doomed himself to a lifetime of having his chain yanked by the Acorn.
- Tank and his trophies from Surf's Up. He's named them all and during the scene his mother calls out: "are you polishing your trophies again?" To the camera he mutters: "I'll polish later."
- Gnomeo and Juliet is just what it sounds like: two garden gnomes who are Star-Crossed Lovers. Another gnome, Gnomeo's pal Benny, later gets romantically involved with a doll and sets their plastic flamingo friend back up with his ex-flame, another plastic flamingo.
Films -- Live Action
- There are Pirates of the Caribbean fics involving the boats. Black Pearl×Flying Dutchman, for example.
- Don't forget Jack and the Black Pearl. Seriously, he shows more devotion to that ship than any human character. Pursuing it for ten years, willing to do anything to obtain it, lovingly caressing it when he reunites with it, sadly stroking it goodbye when he has to abandon it to the Kraken, being stuck in the Locker with it and refusing to leave it there, obsessively asserting his captaincy of it at every opportunity he gets... yeah.
- Shipping. You Keep Using That Word. I am not sure it means what you think it means.
- Jack's relationship with his hat could also be considered this.
- He also has a jar of dirt...
- A few fans also see see it between Davy Jones and that bucket from the third film.
- Austin Powers: "Mini Me! Stop humping the laser! Alright, why don't you and the frikking laser get a frikking room."
- Not exactly a pairing per se, but there's a fan-made Image Macro floating around in which a pair of AT-ATs from Star Wars were... well, let's not go there...
- But there is Han and the Millennium Falcon.
- American Pie: "This one time, at band camp..."
- The pie...is not an example. It's simply a means to an end.
- This actually happens in My Big Fat Independent Movie with the Sickeningly Sweet French girl and a foul-mouthed answering machine. The sex is far more than implied.
- Leon and his plant.
- Wet Hot American Summer: "Well, I'm gonna go hump the fridge."
- The entire 1979 film Demon Seed is about the computer AI named Prometheus that forces a woman to have sex with it/him, so it can breed a human/machine hybrid to take over the World and stop mankind from polluting the environment.
- Chuck and Wilson in Cast Away. Try to watch the scene when Wilson floats away and not tear up a little.
- The movie Christine, based on the Stephen King novel.
- The car advert in Southland Tales you know the one.
- The Bear Jew×his bat from Inglourious Basterds if some fanfictions are to be believed.
- Anchorman: "I love lamp..."
- Do you really love the lamp, or are you just saying it because you saw it?
- The drill sergeant in Full Metal Jacket tells each of the new recruits to give their rifle a girl's name "because this is the only pussy you will ever get!" Private Pyle, after he goes insane, seems more than a little doting over his rifle (Charlene, if you were wondering).
- Kumar from Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle can easily be paired up with the giant bag of pot he found. It's even shipped again in the sequel.
- But it is way easier to ship them with the White Castle hamburgers from their first movie.
- The second chapter of the Hongkong movie Red Cliff depicts the historical straw boat ruse, where a fake invasion of battleships covered in straw, with straw effigies representing soldiers to boot, serves to collect incoming arrows. Tactician Zhuge Liang says nothing of these details, or much of anything for that matter, to his assistant as they sail into enemy lines on one of the straw boats - which leads the assistant to start talking to one of the effigies.
- In Frank Miller's gonzo adaptation of Will Eisner's The Spirit, the One True Pairing of the eponymous hero is his own hometown Central City.
My city, I cannot deny her. My city screams. She is my mother. She is my lover, and I am her Spirit. |
- The Maiden Heist is about three museum security guards so obsessed with their respective favourite artpieces, they attempt the titular heist to save them from being relocated to a Copenhagen museum.
- In The Red Green Show Movie, Duct Tape Forever, Ranger Gord has spent years living alone in his fire watchtower in the woods and has gone more than a little crazy from loneliness. He owns a tree trunk that looks suspiciously like the torso of a naked woman, and when he and Red joke lightheartedly about all the paperwork down at the county records office Gord suddenly breaks into sobs, lamenting "When I think of all the trees that gave their lives for that paperwork! I dated some of those trees, you know!"
- Tim Burton's Alice in Wonderland shows the Cheshire Cat as having some sort of unexplained attraction to the Mad Hatter's hat.
- In The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, Captain Nemo refers to the Nautilus as his "lady." It's meant metaphorically—the ship is his only true love—but could be taken in this context as well.
- Sleeper - Woody Allen's character gets caught by the authorities after he hides in the Orgasmatron, and emerges a shredded, grinning wreck. When he's assimilated and taken to his new home he sees the machine and starts treating it very...affectionately.
- In The Smurfs, Grouchy falls in love with a green M&M plushie in a toy store and even has a romantic get-together with one in the end credits.
- Montgomery Scott in the '09 Star Trek comes close:
Scotty: So the Enterprise has had her maiden voyage, has she? I'd like to get my hands on her "ample nacelles", if you'll pardon the engineering parlance... |
- Jules makes out with a wall-mounted wolf head while playing "Truth or Dare" in The Cabin in the Woods.
Literature
- An A Series of Unfortunate Events fic paired baby Sunny with a heart-shaped smiley balloon.
- Also, in The End, when Olaf embraces his weapons - a harpoon gun and a container of poisonous mushrooms - as if they're the only things he loves.
- Also, as suggested in the The Beatrice Letters, Vice Principal Nero and his violin.
- The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:
- Marvin the Paranoid Android and Zem, a sentient mattress. Something definitely went down in that swamp...
- Another canon example is Marvin×Sirius Cybernetics Corporation Happy Vertical People Transporter (an elevator). The reason said elevator took Zaphod up instead of its desired direction? "I'm only doing this because I like your robot."
- There's also the radio show-based song "Marvin I Love You".
- Hitchhikers and their towels.
- The Warrior Cats fandom loves Jayfeather×stick (Woodenshipping). Yes, one of the main characters and a stick. But it's a stick that he's virtually obsessed with...
- Twilight: Edward Cullen×Piano.
- Don't forget Bella×Cliff. You know, like in the second book...
- And Team Tyler's Van, who say that Bella and the van that Edward stopped from running her over in the first book were destined to be together.
- Bella×Cactus in the musical.
- The Lord of the Rings: Orthanc×Barad-Dur and Minas Tirith×Minas
IthilMorgul? Hey, Love Makes You Evil.- A more prominent and canon example is Gollum and the Ring? In all fairness to Gollum, that ring is pretty seductive and, to say the least, really gets around.
- Or Feanor and his Silmarils? He loves them more than essentially anything else. So does everyone else apparently.
- For Good Omens, there is Crowley's Bentley/Crowley, Bentley/Aziraphale's bookshop and Aziraphale/one of Crowley's houseplants all written in the book's Kink Meme. There is also some fanart of the Bentley shamelessly cheating with Aziraphale, much to Crowley's dismay.
- The car in the Stephen King novel Christine developes an unhealthy obsession with her owner.
- Leviathan×FUCKUP in the third book of the Illuminatus-trilogy is a canon ship.
- Discworld: Rincewind×potatoes is pretty much canon.
- 100% canon in Thomas Pynchon's Vineland: one minor character fucks his car.
- One of the Bolo books has Commander Paul Merril fall in love with Nike, a smarter-than-usual prototype Bolo (a gigantic, self-aware supertank). Nike also falls for him and the develop a sweet little relationship as they patrol their forgotten backwater outpost. At least until they both die defending the planet from mercenaries.
- A later story, Old Soldiers, gets weird with this. Captain Maneka Trevor develops a very close partnership with her Bolo Lazarus, to the point where her husband eventually describes it as a three person relationship, but since by that point Maneka is an uploaded personality occupying Lazarus' backup processor (and has been since before they were married), is the cargo ship side of the triangle Maneka×Lazarus or Hawthorne×Maneka?
- Cargo OT3. Clearly.
- A later story, Old Soldiers, gets weird with this. Captain Maneka Trevor develops a very close partnership with her Bolo Lazarus, to the point where her husband eventually describes it as a three person relationship, but since by that point Maneka is an uploaded personality occupying Lazarus' backup processor (and has been since before they were married), is the cargo ship side of the triangle Maneka×Lazarus or Hawthorne×Maneka?
- The Reapers has Angel speculate on Willie Brew and Arno's relationships with the cars they repair, saying that he would be unsurprised to enter their auto-shop and find one or both of them engaged in "sexual acts of an auto-motive nature".
- Foundation's Edge and Foundation and Earth, two late additions to Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, feature the protagonist Golan Trevize forming an oddly emotional bond with the computer of his ship, the Far Star. Nothing comes of it, though.
- Twenty Years After reveals that as a teenager, Athos had a crush on a Greek statue.
- Vlad×Teldra could qualify in the Dragaera novels after Issola.
- In Brokedown Palace, Miklos rubs the leg of the statue of Verra to check its texture, then realizes this might be considered perverted, so he does it again just to be contrary.
- Mariel of Redwall: Gabool's behaviour towards the stolen bell is decidedly creepy, prior to his devolving into No Rest for The Wicked mode. "Speak to me, pretty, we must get to know each other ..." He was actually a lot closer to the I Have You Now, My Pretty routine with the bell than he or any of the other rats ever got with Mariel. (Probably because Mariel was about twelve and the target audience are even younger.)
Live-Action TV
- The Muppets Valentine Show reveals that grumpy, unapproachable George the janitor does have something he loves; his mop. Even George is amazed when he realizes this.
- The Winchesters' Impala from Supernatural gets paired with a number of other automobiles, including KITT, various Transformers, Crowley's Bentley, and John Winchester's truck, and sometimes is written as a cursed object, or cursed person, who occasionally becomes human. With predictable results.
- TARDIS/Impala is popular among Super Who fans. The DeLorean time machine is their offspring.
- There is also a highly amusing Castiel/Hamburger ship making the rounds.
- Doctor Who's a bit crazy with this (though we should point out that the TARDIS is sentient, and therefore would go under Robo Ship).
- The TARDIS has also been paired with the computer system at Torchwood Three.
- There's an entire community for Jack/the Doctor's severed hand; the Master as well has been paired with it.
- Hand×Resurrection Glove.
- The Tissue Compression Eliminator has been paired with the Sonic Screwdriver. It's madness. For added fun, include the Laser Screwdriver as well for that spicy Foe Yay angle.
- Rose×Jack×Nine's leather jacket.
- TARDIS/Enterprise exists. They have a baby, which apparently takes after its mum.
- Which one would that be?
- The TARDIS is definitely female.
- Which one would that be?
- The sonic screwdriver has been paired with multiple companions and Torchwood women. If it works by sound, it produces vibrations...
- Listen, it is physically impossible for Doctor×sonic screwdriver to not exist somewhere...
- In the non-canon Curse of the Fatal Death, the female Doctor happily stated, "It's got 3 settings!", one of which is apparently vibrate.
- Eleven/Fez.
- Heroes:
- Mohinder was once jokingly paired with a smallish ceramic elephant he owns.
- Nathan was shipped with a zuchinni.
- Sylar×Mohinder's brain, if that qualifies.
- Hiro×Waffles!
- iCarly: Spencer/Bottle Bot, Gibby/Shirt.
- Firefly. Never mind that Serenity is literally a Cargo Ship, half the cast has been paired with it.
- Mal×Serenity, obviously.
- Kaylee×Serenity. DO NOT insult Serenity in front of her.
- Kaylee×unspecified battery-powered object is canon, and according to a possibly unreliable character, "Engines get her hot."
- River×Serenity (look at how much she feels up parts of the ship!) and also River×coffin ("I'm very comfortable.")
- Kaylee×strawberries.
- Jayne×Vera. Chances are, it's most weapons.
- Power Rangers SPD: Bridge×toast OTP!
- Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Tommy×Saba. Of course, Saba is sentient, so it may not count.
- Power Rangers Operation Overdrive Ronny×Drill Driver. It exists.
- Heck, Ronny×drills is canon. In general, the way Ronny gets around anything technological is a goldmine for such things. Zordgasm! (You'd think when Mack turns out to be a robot she'd be all over him...)
- To a certain extent there's a certain level between every Ranger and their Zord (think back to Kimberly's Big No when the Thunder Zords were destroyed.) The most obvious was Tommy×Dragonzord.
- Kirk and the Enterprise, in Star Trek: The Original Series. This is as canon as canon gets: he talks about her in a dreamy, romantic way, expressly compares her to a woman, and the women in his life all know that they can't compete with her. In one episode, of course, a "programming error" has the ship's computer calling him "dear" and "darling".
- In another episode, an alien woman comes on board whose tears cause all men (of any race) to fall in love with her on contact. They have no effect on Kirk, because he just loves the ship more.
- In "The Naked Time", he even starts going on about how she won't let him date anyone else.
- Also, there is a novel in the Expanded Universe where the computer on the Enterprise falls in love with him, and exhibits all the traits of a Clingy Jealous Girlfriend.
- For that matter, the novel The Wounded Sky by Diane Duane (involving a new experimental FTL drive that turns out to break down the boundaries of reality itself as an unintended side effect) features a short scene/hallucination(?) in which Kirk appears to directly experience what being a starship is like from the Enterprise's perspective... and that suggests that his feelings may not be unrequited.
- This is the subject of Leslie Fish's Filk Song "Iron Mistress".
- Please to be reading this fic, which is not the only one of its kind out there. Also, be aware the rest of the Kink Meme is mostly NSFW.
- As of the latest movie, Scotty×Enterprise also has a legitimate claim.
Scotty: She is one well-endowed lady! I'd like to get my hands on her ample nacelles, if you'll pardon the engineering parlance. |
- In TOS, Scotty's relationship was more of a proud parent thing. Naturally, this means if you mess with the Enterprise... Yeah.
- Scotty sure does love his scotch.
- Star Trek: Voyager: Once upon a time, Captain Janeway was given a prehensile plant. It grabbed her. The fans and their keyboards lived happily ever after.
- In the TV series Eureka, the AI that runs Sheriff Jack Carter's house, S.A.R.A.H., seems to act a lot like a Clingy Jealous Girl and a housewife (pun very much intended) toward him.
- Fargo has a tendency to create these. Not only was S.A.R.A.H. his creation, he also created an AI (Tabitha) for his car, which also turned into a Clingy Jealous Girl when he sold her (the car was an ancient Chrysler); she kidnapped him after making him fall into her trunk. As part of some very blatant but still well-done Product Placement, he settles the dispute by transferring Tabitha to his new Subaru.
- Life On Mars has Sam×Mobile Phone and Gene×Cortina. There's one fic in which the Cortina is paired with everybody—including the mobile phone.
- One first-season episode of Fetch! with Ruff Ruffman seemed to hint at Ruff×Fetch 3000.
- Along with the above quote, The Daily Show last year featured a visual representation mocking Rudy Giuliani's seeming obsession with cramming as many "9/11" references as possible in his political speeches, by having a number 9 and number 11 having sex on a bed, complete with erotic music.
- It also ships Washington Monument×Pentagon.
- Stephen Colbert doesn't own a gun, he shares his life with one. On the overturning of Washington DC's ban on handguns: "Sweetness and I can finally be together!" The Couple has since announced their engagement after a hike on the Appalachian Trail, and Sweetness is now pregnant.
- A Colbert Report episode had as it "Wørd" "Just Don't Do It". When trying to turn off teenagers, Colbert came with this:
"If you don't tamp down your physical desires boys, you could go insane and find yourself copulating with the coin return of a vending machine." (Bright side: Free Kit Kat) |
- It may not be a physical object, but there's definite Stephen/Wørd potential going on. The Wørd acts almost exactly like Alice Kramden, after all.
- Sledge Hammer!! Fans don't even need to engage in any Cargo Shipping for this show. Hammer and his gun are clearly the Official Couple!
- Knight Rider: KITT with Michael Knight, Bonnie, or KARR is not at all uncommon in the Knight Rider fan community.
- Battlestar Galactica: "You probably love her more than you love me." Roslin to Adama, referring to the battlestar Galactica.
- In "Flight of the Phoenix" Chief Tyrol runs his hands along the skin of a Viper during a maintenance inspection, while at the same time having flashbacks of caressing his ex-girlfriend Boomer (who turned out to be a "machine"). It's unknown whether this mental association is the reason the Chief labeled the Viper as "damaged beyond repair".
- Boomer herself is seen stroking a Cylon raider in front of Tyrol in an earlier episode. Which he finds somewhat disturbing, though more because he's worried she's a Cylon too.
- Merlin: fans have taken to shipping Arthur×Merlin×hat.
- Also, this.
- Kenan and Kel: Who loves Orange Soda? Kel loves Orange Soda!
- An episode of Pee-wee's Playhouse had Pee-Wee marry fruit salad, because he loved it so much.
- Pee-Wee's relationship with Chairry can be seen this way. In The Pee-wee Herman Show on Broadway we also get Magic Screen x Firefighter.
- CSI: Miami: Horatio×Sunglasses; if only they'd make it canon...
- Top Gear is the embodiment of this trope. Richard Hammond×Oliver the Opel Kadett is pretty much canon, and Jeremy Clarkson has fallen in love with way too many cool cars to list here, his Ford GT and a Bugatti Veyron being the most obvious examples.
- If you can drive and know the first thing about driving and cars, you will be car-sexual for the Bugatti Veyron.
- James May claims that when he drives a cool car he gets a "fizzing sensation just behind [his] penis."
- Jeremy Clarkson waxing lyrical about the Lockheed SR-71 in his 2001 series, Speed. See this video from about fifteen minutes in. His expression. And the way he STROKES it.
- Stargate Atlantis fandom has shipped Atlantis, usually with John (or John with her), and a few threesomes. (Sometimes the city's sentient [or sapient] but never animate, except the one time.)
- There is also a community for Carson×Chair fics.
- Farscape: Crichton with his gun, Winona. He will often comment that other identical pulse pistols "just don't feel the same", and claim "Winona would never have let me down" when other guns fail to work.
- According to Being Human (UK), ghosts can teleport objects, but cannot teleport a baby ghost unless they were biological relations in life. When Annie tries to teleport a baby she gets a toaster instead. Cue jokes about her relationship with it.
- Red Dwarf
- Kryten×Washing Machines... Vacuum Cleaners...
- Let us not forget Rimmer and Inflatable Ingrid.
- Don't all Holly pairings count?
- Lister and the VR machines. BOTH of them!
- There's an episode of The Mighty Boosh involving men dating cocoanuts. And then there's Rudi and his guitar. One of the live shows also presents Vinces enormous blow dryer, so big "you can bum it," but Vince hasn't used that setting yet.
- Ryan Stiles on Whose Line Is It Anyway has been known to be... quite close to one mobile boom cam on stage left (the audience's right). He's kissed it, tried to ride it, gotten into a bullfight with it and according to the deleted outtakes reel, they've... consummated. Yeah.
- James Franco on 30 Rock was shipped with a body pillow named Kimiko-tan. It's strongly implied that he and Liz Lemon had a threesome with it.
- Buster Bluth on Arrested Development briefly had an affair with his mother's maid Lupe, who was fired. He moved on to Lupe's replacement: a robotic vacuum.
- Kendra's favourite stake "Mr. Pointy" in Buffy the Vampire Slayer did get its share of quips.
- Spike's duster is shipped most often with Spike or Buffy, while Mr Gordo has been shipped with Buffy and Angel. This Troper can also recall a rather...interesting Anya/Magic Box register fic as well.
- Chuck Bass and his trademark scarf.
- Cody and his calculator in a recent episode of Suite Life on Deck, although it was in 5th grade. Zack comments that he bought "her" popcorn and took her to the movies.
- In Are You Being Served, Mr. Mash has a somewhat disturbing attitude towards the female mannequins.
- She's a WOODCHIPPER! And her name is SALLY!
- Catherine Howard/Ring. And it's CANON too.
- Grant Imahara does an absolutely adorable imitation of a teen being flustered by the object of his crush when he meets a bomb disposal robot. Colleague Tory Belleci lampshades this by saying things like "well, go on and talk to her".
- In the Glee fandom, Wes/Gavel is incredibly popular.
- Also, Bloor (Blaine/Floor), Blurniture (Blaine/Furniture), Bloffee (Blaine/Coffee), Bloulder (Blaine/Shoulder) and Blocks (Blaine/Socks).
- In Pushing Daisies one of their cases involves a man who believes he's in a relationship with a life size doll. After a friend told him that she wasn't alive the doll strangled her, with him working the hands.
- On The Goodies, Graeme/Computer was very much canon. In one early episode, they went through a Meadow Run, romantic dinners, and near-marriage.
Music
- In the video for Marianas Trench's "Beside You", someone had the bright idea for Josh Ramsay to play the piano standing up. In the directors cut he comments on the fact that in some of the shots it looks like he is "forcing himself on the piano"
- The song "Mi Amigo en el Baño" ("My Friend in the Bathroom"), currently a hit in the Latinoamerican market, is about a woman gloating to her ex-lover that she doesn't need him anymore because, ah, she's got a "friend in the bathroom".
- "Coin-Operated Boy" by the Dresden Dolls. Then again, the song (or at least the bridge) is about how unfulfilling it is to try to replace a human being with a machine.
- Queen's "I'm in Love with My Car". Yes, with, not in.
- To be fair, Roger Taylor wrote that as a jab at one of their roadies who was obsessed with his car. Not to cargo ship-levels, but pretty obsessed.
- To be fair to the roadie in question, the '62 Triumph TR4 roadster is one heckuva car. The grip that those rear wheels have from the improved rear suspension, over the 3A, the sound of the dual Webers cross-mounted on the straight-four engine block... Ahem *wipes drool*
- To be fair, Roger Taylor wrote that as a jab at one of their roadies who was obsessed with his car. Not to cargo ship-levels, but pretty obsessed.
- Dragon Force (video game)'s Vadim Pruzhanov/Keytar.
- Jonathan Coulton ships Pluto×Charon.
- Wouldn't that be incest?
- There's a string of these in the They Might Be Giants song, "Withered Hope." The Sad Sack loves Withered Hope, who has a soul mate that "thinks about" a picture of a crook in a book, who loves a brand new motorbike that is obsessed with Sad Sack.
- Josh Ritter's song "Another New World" describes a man and his ship, the Annabel Lee, on an ill-fated journey to the North Pole. The ship is personified as a lover throughout the song.
- In the music video for "Lovertits" by Peaches, Feist and another girl have sex with their bikes.
- Basshunter and his GPS.
- I can't believe you kiss your car goodnight / Now come on baby tell me, you must be joking, right?
- The Police have the song "Be My Girl/Sally" on their debut album, the second half of which is Andy Summers' loving ode to a blow-up doll.
She came all wrapped in cardboard, all pink and shrivelled down |
- Prince's song "Guitar" features the immortal line 'I love you baby, but not as much as I love my guitar'
- Lyle Lovett's song "Don't Touch My Hat" - 'You can have my girl, but don't touch my hat'. "That's Right (You're Not From Texas)" (but Texas loves you anyway) may count too. And "I Go For Penguins" - 'Penguins are so sensitive to my needs'.
- Side three of Frank Zappa's Joe's Garage, has cult leader L. Ron Hoover tell Joe that he (Joe) is an "latent appliance fethishist" and needs to go into The Closest to find an appliance to love him. Eventually, Joe hooks up with a piggy bank/vacuum cleaner hybrid named Sy Borg.
- Yelle's "Best Friend" in the song "Mon Meilleur Ami" It's about her vibrator.
Print Media
- A Mad Magazine article commented that Emeril got so excited these days "You think he's about to hump that roast"... and the art shows it, though this being Mad, nothing explicit. Complete with "BAM! BAM! BAM!" dialogue.
Radio
- Used in one episode of Hello Cheeky, when Barry explains his deep attraction to string.
I once had a dirty weekend in Hampstead with a ball of twine...it wanted to marry me, but I refused to be tied down! |
- John sneers in contempt at this, before explaining that a bar of soap is...different.
- In one episode of The Phil Harris-Alice Faye Show, we see that Phil loves his English roadster:
Alice: Do you realize how lucky you are having a beautiful home, two wonderful children... |
Theater
- Rent has Smarf, or Mark×Scarf. Primarily used in humor. There's also probably a handful of Roger×Guitar out there...
- There is a fanfic in existence in the Rent fandom with the pairing Mark's Camera/Roger's Guitar. (Or maybe it was Mark's Scarf. But I'm almost 100% sure that Mark's Scarf only appears when someone needs to tie up Mark for bondage!kink purposes.)
- On the subject of Rent, Puccini's La Boheme has "Vecchia Zimarra, Senti," sung by Colline, saying a heartbreaking goodbye... to his coat. Also has the dubious distinction of being one of the only bass arias Puccini wrote that anyone cares about.
- It's got to be better than the current Metropolitan Opera production of Puccini's Tosca, which was supposed to be Darker and Edgier and actually got booed on opening night. Among many, many other things, producer Luc Bondy has the villainous Scarpia illustrate exactly what he's going to do with Tosca, using a statue of the Virgin Mary. In church. In front of a huge crowd gathered for an important religious celebration.
- In The Mystery at Twicknam Vicarage it seems contention over the romantic affections of a sofa and a wing chair are among the possible motives for the murder of the victim, who when first discovered face down on the floor, is first is presumed to be adding the area rug to his conquests.
- Arguably the entire plot of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Starlight Express, in which all the characters are anthropomorphic trains.
- In the Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street fandom, there's Sweeney×Razors. I don't know how that would work, either. One parody (The Vengeful Vengeance of Schmenjamin Schmarker, on fanfiction.net), has Sweeney utter the line, "If I weren't afraid of castrating myself, my friends, I would have sex with you."
- One fan comic has Johnny Depp!Sweeney getting a little too intimate with his razors in the "My Friends" scene, then cutting away to the razor dying nine months later while giving birth to another one of Depp's famous roles... Edward Scissorhands.
- The one act play Soap Opera is the pure, unadulterated embodiment of this trope, where the main character is in love with a washing machine, Hilarity Ensues.
- Little Shop of Horrors brings us Seymour×Audrey II. Might not count since Twoie's sentinet, but still... it's a plant.
- Not to mention Audrey II×Audrey. "Hey little lady, hello...you're lookin' cute as can be..."
- In many adaptations of Othello, Iago rewards Emilia for stealing Desdemona's handkerchief (or belt, or scarf, depending on the update) with sex, usually incorporating the stolen handkerchief into said reward-sex.
- Pee-wee Herman and Chairy have a...special relationship. The less said about it, the better.
- Two Gentlemen of Verona:
Speed: ...you, being in love, cannot see to put on your hose. |
Video Games
- Portal:
- Anything with the Companion Cube.
- Space Sphere×Space.
- Speaking of System Shock, SHODAN's true crossover love is Marathon's Durandal.
- Both Klavier×massage chair and Office Plant×Edgeworth (with the plant topping, but still being an ordinary office plant) exist in short fics in Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney fandom.
- His name is Charley.
- Not to forget Godot×Coffee, Edgeworth×Tea or Klavier×Guitar.
- Fire Extinguisher×Edgeworth. With the fire extinguisher topping.
- No mentions of Ema×Snackoos or Maya×Burgers?
- Phoenix×Attorney's Badge. Apollo may also apply.
- Edgeworth×Tea set, You do NOT want to break it.
- Gumshoe×Angel Starr's Steak-Lunchbox. He sued Maya over it in a certain old trailer, and, finally, got Ema a prison sentence because she apparently ate it.
- Final Fantasy VIII fandom has an inordinate amount of fanfic featuring Seifer×Seifer's trenchcoat.
- Thanks to Dissidia Final Fantasy, we now have the possibly canon shipping of Exdeath and the Void.
- Ditto with Cloud of Darkness/Void. Hell, some fans just make this all into an OT3.
- One of the ex Q&A hosts on Rpgamer.com set up a site where one of his most famous stories paired Rufus Shinra with Furniture! He called Rufus a Furnisexual...
- Then, of course, there's Buster Sword×Nail Bat, Tseng×Coffee, and most infamous of all...
- Cactuar×Sephiroth. That's right, the Cactuar tops!
- Thanks to Dissidia Final Fantasy, we now have the possibly canon shipping of Exdeath and the Void.
- There's an alarming amount of Metal Gear fanfic and art for Snake×the Cardboard Box. It's actually arguably generally better than the stuff for the serious ships.
- Big Boss×Cardboard Box is practically canon if one listens to the right radio broadcasts, which may explain why Eva had to resort to cloning and genetic engineering to bear his children. Hard to convince a man to impregnate you when he's sexually attracted to packaging. And not that kind of packaging. (The more obvious solution would be bubble wrap lingerie.)
- In Persona 4, Adachi×Cabbage. You know it's true.
- There's a character in Knights of the Old Republic where this trope is taken to its logical conclusion. Enjoy the discussions you, Carth, Bastila and Canderous have over it.
- The second game has an Echani love poem... written to an energy shield.
- It's probably easier to find Devil May Cry fanfic shipping Dante×Nevan than Dante×Lady. Nevan is one of his weapons. This, or shipping anyone×any other Devil Arm, is a borderline example though (they're demons transformed into weapons).
- In one of the Devil May Cry manga, Dante says that he once got drunk and proposed to a mop.
- Sonic the Hedgehog: Knuckles and the Master Emerald. What's even more squicky about it is that when you go across continuities, Knuckles seems to go back and forth between this and thinking the damn thing is his mother...
- Project Reality will have Middle-Eastern Coalition soldiers kiss their rifles on occasion.
- Kingdom Hearts:
- Zexion×Peach Iced Tea. Fandom knows this as Serious Business.
- Also Zexion×Lexicon, especially among the "snakesonasora" MST fans.
- Sora×Keyblade and Xemnas×Kingdom Hearts. It exists.
- Sea-salt ice cream is the biggest pimp of all. It gets shipped with Sora, Roxas, Axel, Xion, and DiZ. Especially Roxas. He cares about the ice cream more than his best friend dying.
- Psychonauts: People pair Ford Cruller and his bacon. It's actually rather amusing.
- A canon example is Admiral!Ford Cruller×Canoe.
- Super Robot Wars has Ryusei and his bizarre Canon crushes on feminine-styled Humongous Mecha, especially Valsione. See also the above mention of Humongous Mecha-on-Humongous Mecha Fan Art (Weissritter's about as much of a floozy as its pilot would indicate).
- Anything paired with Lamia Loveless will be this. Suuuure, she's Just a Machine, but she's slowly learning many human emotions, love might be one of them. That, and the recent events provides some Ship Tease with her human ,now half-Einst, commander Axel Almer... (Axel-Lamia is in fact one of the more recent Fan-Preferred Couple)
- From Guilty Gear, there's A.B.A. and Paracelsus, her giant weaponized key.
- Team Fortress 2:
- Heavy and his minigun Sasha. Though it looks like Natascha might be bringing in some competition...
- OT3?
- One of the tie-in comics shows that Sasha has her own bed next to the Heavy's bed.
- Heavy×Sandvich.
- Scout×Sasha? Also, Heavy looks pretty cool in those glasses.
- Sasha×Natascha.
- Soldier×Shovel, usually with Shovel being a bit of Yandere.
- Heavy and his minigun Sasha. Though it looks like Natascha might be bringing in some competition...
- The Legend of Zelda: Link×Master Sword. There's also at least one fic that pairs Sheik with a mailbox.
- That Link×Master Sword pairing has become Hilarious in Hindsight thanks to The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword, where Link's Exposition Fairy, and thus his next possible Shipping candidate, is the (future) Master Sword.
- On that note, Fi×Scrapper. One's the spirit of the (future) Master Sword, the other's a robot. This will end well.
- That Link×Master Sword pairing has become Hilarious in Hindsight thanks to The Legend of Zelda Skyward Sword, where Link's Exposition Fairy, and thus his next possible Shipping candidate, is the (future) Master Sword.
- Among the many Mass Effect fans clamoring for more and more varied Romance Sidequests there is a small but enthusiastic faction in favor of being able to romance Mira, one of the Virtual Intelligence programs that appears in the game. This in spite of the fact that VIs are essentially glorified Clippits.
- The reason Zaeed isn't a romance option is because Jessie is the only rifle for him.
- People ship Joker×Normandy. If you did not expect this, a mental asylum awaits you. The Robo Ship with EDI was inevitable.
- It actually became Canon in Mass Effect 3 when EDI gets, as Joker puts it, a "Sexy new robot body". Naturally Joker has a field day and if Shepard decides to play matchmaker, they eventually do end up dating.
- The Geth Legion repeatedly avoids the question when Shepard asks why they used a piece of his/her armour to repair themself.
Legion: *Long pause* No data available. |
- Halo: Master Chief×Cortana, though which one is the person and which is the mindless inanimate object is up for debate.
- There is a whole mess of Cargo Ships for The World Ends With You. Most of them involve Sho Minamimoto, and are inspired by the line "This mic is zetta sexy!", said after having stolen it from a rock band. Oh, and the giant heaps of garbage he makes and insists on having called art. Not to mention intangibles like the number Pi, which he knows to a million digits, and math in general (Or calculators, text books... I've seen it written he attacked Konishi for insulting one in the kink meme, and it didn't jump out at me as odd at all). This isn't even mentioning the popular crack pairing of Mr. Hanekoma and coffee. On the other hand, Mr. Mew is debatable. (Conversely, I bet Shiki×Clothes is a ship, too.) Plus Neku×Headphones, Neku×CAT's graffiti, Kariya×Lollipop, Beat×Hat×Skateboard, Joshua×Cellphone, Joshua×Frilly Parasol, Not to mention him and the gun. The fanfics I've read usually involve him using it on Neku, but then again, at least one request on the big Livejournal kinkmeme says blowjob using the gun, so... Shuto or Yammer×Pins, On that note, AD!Neku×Pins. Also, so long as we're listing everything spoilery, Prince×Ramen, Megumi or Joshua×Shibuya. Finally, Beat×Curry, a large chunk of fandom's OTP.
- Valkyria Chronicles: Salinas Milton, already a bit of a Handsome Lech, gets extremely defensive whenever someone tries to get close to tanks.
- And from Valkyria Chronicles II, there's Marion Siegbahn, a shocktrooper with an extreme weapon fetish, as in she gets orgasmic with them. She mentions that one of her motivations for entering Lanseal was to get access to its armory.
- Lunar 2: Eternal Blue. Ronfar/His Twig. Oh yeah.
- Metroid: Samus×her armor
- The Tales of the Abyss fandom has Mohs×the Score and Guy×fontech, of course.
- Tales of Symphonia: Raine/Ruins
- Borderlands gives us Patricia Tannis and her recorder. Please note that this is completely canon. Until they broke up, of course. Tannis thinks the recorder was cheating on her. They remained friends, however.
- In Tekken 6, newcomer Lars Alexandersson seems to be wee bit close to fellow newcomer Alisa Boskonovitch...
- Scrin Mothership AI×Foreman 371 in Command & Conquer Tiberium Wars. What? It could happen! The AI even disobeyed orders from the Supervisor to make sure the Foreman escaped Earth alive.
- Some Myst fans enjoy pairing Saavedro with the squee pelt he wears around his arm.
- Castlevania: Curse of Darkness. Hector. Chair. The Woodman's Chair even lampshades it, with instructions to "sit carefully, or it may look rather rude".
- No More Heroes: Diane from Beef Head Video practically confirms Travis×Bizarre Jelly pillow as canon in the first game.
- How about Letz Shake×Dr.Shake?
- aren't they the same person/robot/cyborg thing? Dr shake even says he is going to get revenge for his previous efeat from Henry.
- How about Letz Shake×Dr.Shake?
Letz Shake: Oh, thats good undulation. I think I'm going to lose the BOWEL CONTROL!! |
- One Golden Sun fanfic is Isaac×the roof of his house.
- Star Ocean 2's Ashton really seems to like barrels...
- Gordon Freeman×crowbar.
- Jack×Radio has been thrown around the livejournal anon meme, as well as El Ammo Bandito×Circus of Values Clown machines.
- StarCraft II: Tychus and the Odin. Files have shown that when an Odin is built, Tychus will say "Love at first sight."
- Louis×Peelz. Not to mention I'm sure Coach×Chocolate is also equally as popular.
- The Dark Carnival campaign also gives us Gnome Chompski, a large garden gnome whom can be carried through most of the level. An achievement is given for loving him enough to carry him all the way to the helicopter at the end. This of course results in some players developing an attachment to him.
- Rochelle×Magnum. Considering what she says when she finds one in-game, this is actually canon.
- I.M. Meen's book is made to order, but it isn't to be read.
- His appearance in the ending of the sequel, Chill Manor, has him briefly kneeling on a chair turned to the back. YouTube Poop often reinterprets this scene as him humping the chair.
- For Super Smash Brothers, there has been a preponderance of Sheik/Teacup fanart ever since the adventure mode in Brawl had Sheik stop a battle to join Peach for a Spot of Tea.
- Among others, Touhou fandom has Alice×her dolls (probably canon, as she spends all her time with them and is attempting to make them sentient), Suika×her gourd (also probably canon, as she also spends all her time with it and as a result is never, ever sober), Suwako×her hat (Pyonta), as well as various pairings involving either Kanako's onbashira or Yukari's gaps (sometimes both!).
- World of Warcraft: Drull and Tog'thar, two orcs who have been held prisoner for six years, have developed unusual attachments to their ball-and-chain shackles. They're in therapy for it, although they insist they are happy with Teddy and Laverne and just want to be left alone.
- Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn gave us Gatrie×Tree-in-a-Skirt, which has become very popular with the fans ever since it was mentioned by Shinon.
- Suikoden V has Georg Prime x Cheesecake.
- Dragon Age II has Varric x Bianca, his custom crossbow.
- Isabela also gets some of this... also with Bianca.
- Varric x Bianca is actually canon.
- Tira/Soul Edge. This Yandere has it bad for Nightmare and wants nothing more than to be Mrs. Inferno. Nightmare plans to Devour the Dragon when Tira's soul is ripe enough (or she becomes a liability), but whether or not that counts as Kick the Dog or Pet the Dog is up in the air, seeing as she wants Nightmare to take her soul so she can become one with the sword. This is even lampshaded in Broken Destiny's Gauntlet mode, where she's shown to be Nightmare's Stalker with a Crush (much to his chargin).
- Two such pairings are running gags in Inazuma Eleven fandom:
- Endou x Soccer, because he eats and breathes The Beautiful Game.
Coach Hibiki: [Endou] is the world's number one--no, the universe's number one soccer freak. |
- Fudou x Bench, after Break the Haughty leaves Fudou gets stuck as a benchwarmer for all but half a match of the FFI preliminaries arc.
- In at least one sect of the Mega Man fandom, we are given Turbo Man x Sonic Formula (Quick Man's car).
Web Comics
- Sexy Losers featured a Prince Charming×Cinderella's shoe scene.
- CRFH fans occasionally pair Pepe (Roger's stuffed coyote) with Fluffy (Roger's pet rock).
- CRFH also has Roger×Big Red Button, which has both canon and Word of God behind it.
- What about Hector?
- The Wotch: Cassie×Plant. It's rather one sided, as Cassie dumped a Love Potion into the pot, making it an in-universe case.
- This Cyanide & Happiness comic.
- A Miracle of Science: Mars likes you, and Brazil thinks you're cute.
- This strip of Order of the Stick gives us Elan×Banjo Puppet and Haley×Sack of Gold. And don't forget about Roy and his sword.
- What about Hinjo and his junk? Shutting up now.
- It is impossible for Torg/Chaz to not exist.
- Kevin and Kell has Abby, who literally marries her job. There's also an indication of intimacy with cars (she is an automechanic) and some of the shop equipment.
- Knowing Achewood's fanbase, there are probably some truly demented pairings. Ray×Ray's AIBO. Cartilege Head×The Rollerskate of Doom. Vlad×Soap. Click Robot×Ultra Peanut even.
- Dave Davenport and Lovelace the sentient computer from Narbonic.
- Larxene and Skull-Fucky the skull in Ansem Retort.
- Darth Maul even noted that Skull-Fucky would get pissed if he saw Larxene grinding with a toaster.
- Homestuck: Wayward Vagabond×TaB is practically canon. Just see for yourself.
- Paring random people (usually Bro or Dave) with Lil' Cal is also relatively common.
- At least one Bro/Lil Cal fic exists, see the link in Troll Fic.
- Paring random people (usually Bro or Dave) with Lil' Cal is also relatively common.
- This A Softer World strip.
- Blank It: Lemmo and his hat.
- Girl Genius: Jagermonsters and their hats.
- Also a few mad scientists are discussed in this way in-comic.
- Oglaf features this in a few different contexts, including this.
- Hanna Is Not a Boy's Name with {...}/Paper Crane and Conrad/blood.
- Schlock Mercenary had Schlock's relationship with his Plasgun bordering on this.
- Captain Landon and "Tenzy". But then, Tenzy is not only a mini-superweapon with built-in pocket factory, but a fully sapient AI, and later also his symbiote, linked with Landon's implants via prosthetic arm. Breya commented on his "budding fetish for a particular heavy weapon", then various strange dialogues followed.
- In Problem Sleuth, anyone with the fan. Wifehearst might also count, as she was originally a playing piece in a game of Life.
- The Thrilling Adventures of Lovelace and Babbage: Ada Lovelace showed a little too much affection towards the Difference Engine at the end of "The Organist".
Web Original
- Lonelygirl15: P. Monkey×Bree, P. Monkey×Sarah, P. Monkey×Mallory, P. Monkey×Jonas, etc. Although none of those are serious. Hope they're not, anyway.
- LOLcats': Lolrus×bucket. They even have their own website.
- Turtle×Rock in this cute animation.
- Twilight the Musical has spawned a following of Bella×Cactus shipping.
- Not to mention Edward×Edward doll.
- So is that a Love Triangle with Evil Edward? And where does Cardboard Edward factor in?
- Not to mention Edward×Edward doll.
- Ask That Guy really loves his pipe.
- He also had a love affair with a GPS in Episode 54.
- And Mike J is really close to his Film Brain puppet.
- Oancitizen and his trashcan.
- Salad Fingers loves rusty spoons. And rusty kettles. And hooks. And taps.
- Profound Moments in Left 4 Dead 2 gives us AovnickxRamirez, the garden gnome in the Dark Carnival campaign.
- Homestar Runner:
- At one point, Strong Bad fell in love with a wagon full of pancakes.
- Homestar inadvertently addresses this trope while running a recruiting booth.
"Say, you got a girlfriend? Well, what if your girlfriend was a wooden spoon and an orange plastic bowl? That'd be really weird, man. What kind of screwed-up kid are you? We don't recruit your kind! Get out of here!" |
- The Cinder Block×The Stop Sign, though their relationship is allegedly troubled.
- It's the King of Town's fiftieth anniversary with Brunswick Stew.
- Frank Bennedetto is a popcorn maker and his mother is Marzipan's microwave. No matter who the father is, it would logically have to count.
- Red vs. Blue:
- Tucker×rock. It's canon!
- Lopez×Sheila.
- According to Word of God, Sheila and Andy were supposed to be exes.
- What about Caboose×Sheila? Does an unrequited relationship count?
- Some fans theorize Church×Sniper Rifle, Sarge×Shotgun and Simmons 2.0 (he's almost all machine, it counts)×Sister.
- Tucker/Energy sword. "Don't talk that way when I'm playing with my thing."
- LP-er Helloween4545 loves shotguns.
- Baman and Tuba.
- EPICMEALTIME's Harley Morenstein strokes and kisses the Sloppy Super Bowl Big Ben Roethlisburger in the 2nd bloopers video.
- Profound Moments in Left 4 Dead 2 Aovnick really loves Ramirez the garden gnome.
- Ryukaki/bike is an extremely popular pairing. People have actually written porn of it.
- Apparently another fad is an inversion: "transformation into clothes" fetish fic. Example: New Outfit - Redrawn! Part 2 by Redflare500
Western Animation
- Avatar: The Last Airbender:
- Sokka×Boomerang was the show's first canon ship.
- Azula×The Drill. Nowhere near as horrific as it sounds, actually.
- Azula×Power
- Boomerang×Sword, with a jealous Sokka.
- Boomerang or Sword×Suki's Fan is kind of cute.
- Iroh×Tea, admitted by the creators to be canon.
- Zuko×Honor. Admit it. You ship them.
- Aang×staff. If it didn't exist before it does now.
- I think Toph×Dirt is canon.
- Ozai×Tree, a.k.a. Trozai... y'know, from the flashback in "Zuko Alone". The tree was consoling him after Ursa left.
- Cabbage Merchant x Cabbage...I guess he'll have to fight Adachi over it.
- Now in Sequel Series The Legend of Korra.
- Mako's Scarf×Everyone. Yes, everyone loves it!
- Korra×Fighting is catching on quite a bit.
- One of these was canon in Futurama: Bender×Planet Express Ship. Fry even lampshades it: "Wow, Bender, are you and the ship an item? I mean, I know you're both items..."
- Double bonus points considering that both are the "cargo" in Cargo Ship and PES is an actual cargo ship.
- Also, Fry once made out with a radiator.
- Hey, you gotta admit she was hot.
- Fry also dated a robot clone of Lucy Liu.
- Fry and Bender are a bit too close sometimes as well.
- Bender and Amy protested for Proposition Infinity.
- Our love is just like yours, only hotter 'cuz I'm in it.
- Scruffy and the wash bucket.
"I'm a man, and you're janitorial equipment." |
- The American Dragon: Jake Long episode "Ski Trip" had Spud x Ski Lift chair, complete with a fantasy montage in which Spud marries the device and they have half-human, half-ski lift cheerleader. The relationship ends by the end of the episode, with Spud claiming "I broke up with you!")
- Family Guy has a cutaway gag where Peter tried to marry a blueberry pie. ("Loooove you"). In the amount of time it took for the lawyer to get over his disbelief and retrieve the necessary papers to fill out, Peter had managed to eat the pie.
- Peter and a bag of fat that was sucked out of Lois's body. It was exactly what it looked like.
- Peter and a cardboard cutout of Kathy Ireland from the Drunken Clam.
- Peter and his Surfing Bird record, who he sleeps with his arms around and states, "I took it to bed, had sex with it..."
- New Brian and Stewie's teddy bear, Rupert.
- Stewie and Rupert have a Ho Yay relationship.
- And there was also a cutaway gag about a woman catching an STD from a toilet.
- Meg and hot dogs.
- Homer Simpson once had an illicit affair with a shish kebab.
- As well as a giant sandwich... let's just say Homer and food.
- "Oh, Television....teacher, mother, secret lover..."
- On the Rule of Funny-based side of canon, Spunky the dog on Rocko's Modern Life fell in love with a mop in "Clean Lovin'". Following the series' proud tradition of Getting Crap Past the Radar, there is even a scene that heavily implies Spunky actually had sex with it.
- The psychologist Rocko hires to cure Spunky of the fixation also winds up fixated on the mop, and is shown taking it on a date near the end of the episode.
- Heifer and...a milking machine. Yes, Heifer gets hooked up to a milking machine at one point, and enjoys it. Keep in mind that he is a male. He even gives a tearful goodbye to the machine. There is no other way to interpret this, but lord knows I've tried.
- Ben 10×Omnitrix. This one may actually be less crack than most. The Clingy MacGuffin has all the traits of a Clingy Jealous Girlfriend—refusing to work at first after Ben left it in his closet for five years, beeping annoyingly when Julie gets too close to him, refusing to let him go Ripjaws to save Kai...
- Ben×Eunice.
- For some reason, there's Kevin×Car. No, really. It's not all that crack, considering the events of "Paradox".
- Danny Phantom, meet Fenton Thermos. Fenton Thermos, meet Danny, I think the two of you will get along great.
- Also, Tucker and his PDA.
- Vlad and his Ray Nitsche Football. That's hot.
- Canon example: SpongeBob SquarePants and the Krabby Patty in "To Love a Patty"—one kept unrefrigerated long enough to have mold. And in what is the funniest and/or most disgusting part of the episode, at the end, he eats it, mold, fungus and all.
- The early episode "Just One Bite" included a montage where Squidward falls in love with, marries, and grows old with a Krabby Patty. It's a Dream Sequence, but still.
- Spongebob×Spatula. How come this hasn't made it here yet? There was practically a whole episode on it!
- How come Mr. Krabs×Money hasn't been mentioned yet neither? That one has to be the most canon one in the show...
- Squidward×Clari. He even sleeps with the instrument. "I've got a hot date with a little lady, and her name is Clarinet."
- Plankton and Karen. They're married in canon, and in one chapter they said their relationship started in junior high school or so...when Karen was just a security camera...
- And there's Patrick who marries a street lamp, because of a lie made up by Mr. Krabs.
- The Looney Tunes Show has Elmer Fudd and a
grilledgwilled cheese sandwich. - One episode of The Venture Brothers has The Monarch having sex with the broken down remains of Guard-O, the Venture Brothers' non-sentient security robot. This is even weirder in context: its monitor was displaying Dr. Venture's face, and he said he was trying to give it chlamydia.
- After building his own
Goblin Glider"Butter-Glider", he becomes obsessed with it to the point of sleeping with it and having rooftop picnics with it. His wife is unamused. - Herr Trigger and his guns.
- Phantom Limb and Lady Nightshade (a.k.a. a woman's shoe)
- In the pilot they had a ninja trying to get hold of Dr. Ventures new invention. Not to steal it, but to do... other things with it.
- After building his own
- In Total Drama World Tour, Beth starts a relationship with a pole, the same pole Bridgette made out with a couple of episodes before. Yeah, I'm not making this up.
- Cody×Statue of Liberty.
- Alejandro/Pineapple
- Lurking amidst the murky sea of Invader Zim crack pairings, pairings exist involving Zim's computer, Tak's ship, Zim's PAK (the backpack thing that's attached to his spine, filled with useful tools) and GIR. The last one is a borderline example, however, and is often done in complete seriousness.
- Let's not explain the scene in which the show explains what happens when Irkens are born. "I love you, cold unfeeling robot arm!"
- Actually, there are some scenes in (at least) the episodes "Bloaty's Pizza Hog" and "Tak, the Hideous New Girl" which imply that GIR has a (obviously one-sided) little crush on Gaz.
- Perfect Hair Forever: "Can you get this Vacuum cleaner to f*ck this cake?", Uncle Grandfather.
- Transformers Animated features canonical Constructicons×nonsentient cars.
- There's also Beast Wars Megatron x Beast Wars Megatron's Beast Mode Head. He's actually seen petting it like a Right-Hand-Cat sometimes, and there's scenes like the time it looks around while Megs is 'asleep,' or Megatron turning away from the screen and his head-hand quickly turns to look at it, as if sneaking a peak when Megatron isn't paying attention. However, it has little in the way of support compared to the true OTP of Beast Wars: Megs x rubber ducky.
- Thomas the Tank Engine: Edward×James. There's fanart. Seriously. (Warning: Potentially ruined childhood contained within.)
- Storm Hawks: "The Condor demands an apology!" Stork×Condor is canon, really.
- Spudken. Kim Possible fanfic crack pairing of the blue-shinned, scar-possessing Dr. Drakken, one of the main villains, who falls in love with... a potato. Thank you, Neo.
- This video.
- Code Lyoko: Some of the fans accuse Jérémie of caring about the Supercomputer more than his girlfriend, Aelita. Some jokingly... some not so much. Sissi actually makes a comment in-story to Aelita that Jérémie is "already married to a computer chip."
- Ed, Edd 'n' Eddy: The Valentine's Day episode has Tiny Love Imps forcing the entire cast (and a hoagie) to randomly fall in love. As there are more boys than girls, they have Ed falling in love with the sandwich, and Eddy falling in love with Plank.
- And let's not forget Kevin and that damn bike. It's practically the only thing in the world that he obsseses over more than foiling Eddy. And that's saying ALOT.
- Aqua Teen Hunger Force: "Gentlemen... BEHOLD! I have made LOVE to this MACHINE! And now, in retrospect, I ASK WHY!"
- And Master Shake and Carl were violated by the eHelmets special add-ons.
- I'm pretty sure the clown-wig Carl wore did some things to him, sexually.
- Technically, Handbanana.
- If Deviant ART fan art is anything to go by, Mira and XR (a robot) seems to be a popular pairing in the Buzz Lightyear of Star Command fandom.
- Wolverine and the X-Men's Bad Future version of Lorna Dane reconstructs and reanimates a Sentinel, which bad future Marrow dubs "Rover", fixates upon, repairs, talks to, spends all her time with, and ultimately betrays Professor Xavier to Master Mold in rage and grief over Bishop sacrificing Rover as a decoy.. Note that Rover displays minimal, pet-like sentience and CAN ONLY SAY THE WORD "DESTROY".
- At the end of Madagascar 2, Skipper of the Penguins marries a... Hawaiian doll.
- Then there is the spin-off series The Penguins of Madagascar that shows both Rico and Julien showing interest in a large barbie doll. Even Skipper makes a subtle pass at her. Miss the wife already, Mr. Married-man?
- One episode has Kowalski falling in love with the animal control van.
- Julien had a vaguely disturbing semi-Ho Yay semi-Narcissistic obsession with "Lemmy", the robot version of himself, and Mort was jealous of it. Then, at the end of the episode, it gets dragged offscreen by a space squid and is never seen again, bringing the possibility of Naughty Tentacles into the mix ...
- "Quiet, Maurice! I am wooing the smoothie!"
- In Courage the Cowardly Dog, a goose god falls in love with Eustace's truck because of the sound of its horn, and eventually ascends with the truck to heaven (they get a new truck). In a later episode there's a quick cameo of the goose god cuddling it on a fluffy cloud.
- Never explicitly shown in the series, but Ro and Zeta from The Zeta Project are a very justifiable example of this trope.
- Bill Plympton, having a taste for the bizarre, has some:
- His first long film "The Tune" features a noseless cab driver who has a broken relationship with... guess what.
- "The Fan and the Flower", an unusually sweet short film, completely devoid of his usual Deranged Animation.
- Clerks the Animated Series: "And then that Caitlyn chick started making out with the Ferris wheel!"
- Hank Hill from King of the Hill is a prime example in canon. He ignored his wife over his guitar for a while in an earlier episode. He cried over his car breaking down like a dying family member, and of course "Sweet Lady Propane."
- "Sir, we go back fifteen years, and in all that time I have only had one mistress, and her name is propane."
- Oh, and don't forget his lawn. "I think you owe me, and my lawn, an apology! ....We're waiting!"
- In Adventures in Care-a-Lot, Grizzle×Mr. Beaks, in that Mr. Beaks is a bird made out of scrap parts, who Grizzle treats as animate (and more than just a friend), but everyone else sees as inanimate (most of the time).
- Canon example: Odie in The Garfield Show falls in love with a brush in one episode.
- Robot Chicken has an ongoing gag involving the Humping Robot, who has vigorously loved both a washing machine and a jukebox in his time.
- You forgot about the Casino slot machine.
- And Herbie. And a bell.
- An early episode of The Fairly OddParents had Cosmo and Wanda acting out a Jerry Springer esque talk show, in which Cosmo played a redneck who married his car. In a later episode, Unnamed Parent Mr. Turner falls in love with his car.
- Then there is Cosmo/Phillip, i.e. the nickel that Cosmo found and keeps in the goldfish castle, in one episode he is seen sleeping with it in his arms, while Wanda was right next to him.
- In another episode, Mr. Turner whilst under a spell by Cupid's arrow comes very close to marrying a dead rose bush.
- In an episode of Spliced Peri, Entrèe and Two-legs Joe all fall in love with "Helen", a pancake.
- Gorillaz biography Rise of the Ogre actually describes Murdoc's pelvic thrusts in the end of the "Feel Good Inc" video as "bass-shagging action". There is fanfic.
- The Bugs Bunny cartoon "Rabbit Every Monday" starts with Bugs cooking carrots over a rotisserie spit singing "It's Magic" (Oh carrots are divine, you get a dozen for a dime, it's magic...). At the end of his tune he takes a carrot from the spit and lovingly caresses it.
- "The Grey Hounded Hare" has Bugs fall for an electric rabbit from a dog race. He called her "Dreamboat" and was determined to save her from the dogs that were chasing her. Bugs was electrocuted when he tried to kiss her, but didn't mind.
- "Hair-Raising Hare" has Bugs build a robot that looked like a female rabbit in a slinky evening gown to confuse his enemies. At the end of the episode, the robot walked by and Bugs pointed and said "Eh, mechanical." Then she kissed him on the cheek. "So she's mechanical!" Bugs says before following her.
- Similarly, Daffy Duck fell for a mechanical duck in "A Coy Decoy". They even had little clockwork ducklings together.
- Fred Jones on Scooby Doo Mystery Inc has an obsession with traps. His bedroom is littered with them.
- Dr. Blight×Mal from Captain Planet and the Planeteers.
- Hyena×Coyote from Gargoyles.
- Captain Murphy×Bucket-Head Wendy from Sealab 2021.
- An episode of Tiny Toon Adventures had Montana Max fall in love with a giant gold nugget that he called "Goldie".
- Not to mention the Prom episode, where Gogo Dodo's date is a fire hydrant. Named Suzie. And then there's Bugs Bunny, who's depicted as being pretty much married to his Oscar...um, I mean Schloscar.
- Chuckie and Boppo. A kid his age should be outside playing with his friends, not sitting alone in his room bopping his Boppo.
- The Veggie Tales song "His Cheeseburger."
- King George and the Ducky features a king who really loves his duck. That it's a G-rated version of King David's adultery with Bathsheba makes it weirder.
- In The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack, Peppermint Larry's wife is a candy sculpture... and in a truly Flapjackian twist, it turns out to be a Love Triangle with Captain K'nuckles secretly in love with her. At one point he even runs off with her, leaving Peppermint Larry heartbroken.
- In American Dad, Stan has had some strange interactions with a gun and a lighter.
- There was also one episode where Stan ran outside to console his SUV, saying he was going to 'tongue [it's] gas-hole'.
- Dan×Turkey Sub in Dan Vs. "The Fancy Restaurant."
- The My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic fandom has Applejack×Bloomberg or Fluttershy×Bloomberg (Bloomberg's a tree), Derpy Hooves×Muffin, Soarin'×Pie, Pinkamena×Madame Le Flour, Rainbow Dash×Kitchen Sink, and, thanks to the fanfic Progress, Luna×Abacus. The Season 2 premiere introduced Rarity×Tom the Rock (who's also known as Dan, thanks to Youtube's auto-caption generator), and "Lesson Zero" lead to people shipping Big Macintosh and Twilight's Smarty Pants doll.
- Also Tom x Bloomberg
- There's even parings with Princess Celestia and the door she unlocked by sticking her horn in the "keyhole" in "The Return of Harmony Part One".
- And, of course, Trixie×Pinecone.
- The Twisted Tales of Felix the Cat did an episode where the Bag of Tricks got stolen, and Felix went into spasms of animated angst. He even had a hard time sleeping alone, and carried a wallet full of photos of himself and the bag in various romantic scenes. The show also gave us Bermuda Triangle×Times Square, Felix×Cactus, and Cactus×Mountain. None of these are too surprising in a show where Everything Talks, but they're still pretty darn weird.
- In an episode of The Looney Tunes Show, Lola gets into an entire conversation with an armoire, and is seen telling it that she already has a boyfriend.
Real Life
- Christian Westron Chandler and a PS3. Pass the Brain Bleach please.
- Klüver-Bucy syndrome can lead patients to seek sexual stimulation with "unusual or inappropriate objects". Once a man suffering from this was arrested for having sex with the sidewalk (this case of a man jailed for trying to do the same with a bicycle must be similar).
- Mrs. Berlin Wall, who coined the term "objectum sexual" for this phenomenon.
- Erika La Tour Eiffel, not to mention her "exes" a bow, a katana, and *an F-15*.
- Spencer Pratt×creepy flesh colored beard.
- A woman named Jannene Swift married a rock in 1976.
- Probably an urban legend, but see this Snopes thread for a nice collection of terrible puns regarding their union.
- In another case of Objectum Sexuality, Amy Wolfe is getting married to 1001 Nachts at Knoebels.
- At one point, prostitutes in some part of India used to marry trees. In this way, they would emancipate themselves from parental control without saddling themselves with husbands.
- Never get between a woman and her double A battery operated friend.
- Or the non-battery operated cousin of that battery operated friend.
- Or her detachable showerhead.
- This video.
- This Cracked article.
- To an extent, a lot of people have this with their cars.
- Sebastion Vettel, a Formula One Champion, names all of his cars. It's a popular joke for him to have some form of relationship with said car. His car in 2012 is called Abbey. He likes to love them and leave them.
- Queen committed a song to this particular form of affection, as mentioned in the music section above.
- And let's not forget the love hate relationship most people have with their computers.
- Many, many musicians are like this with their instruments.
- Apparently, in 1979, a woman was officially married to her fifty-pound pet rock. There were over twenty witnesses.
- Aren't we forgetting SAL9000 here? Nene Anegasaki isn't exactly sentient...
- Not to be outdone, a Korean otaku married his Fate Testarossa body pillow.
- Gene Roddenberry's ode to his airplane, "Nightingale Woman", which he later reused in the Star Trek pilot as "one of the most passionate love sonnets of the past couple of centuries".
"My love has wings, slender feathered things with grace and upswept curve and tapered tip." |
- Seriously.
- The common phrase "I'm married to my job."
- Most band geeks love their instruments far more than their significant others.
- Most geeks love their computers as much as or more than their significant others, especially if they've put a lot of time and/or money into them.
- You and your hand. There's a reason it's called A Date with Rosie Palms.
- Don't forget dildos. And they're not just for women.
- Titanic and the iceberg that sunk it. No, really.