Interspecies Romance/Live-Action TV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


Examples of Interspecies Romance in Live-Action TV include:

  • The Korean Drama My Girlfriend Is a Nine-Tailed Fox features the titular nine-tailed fox, a mythical Korean creature which takes the form of a human woman (and a ridiculously good-looking one in this instance).
    • Also fellow Korean tv series, Forbidden Love and Gumiho: Tales of a Fox Child.
  • In an episode of Green Acres, Arnold the Pig falls in love with Mr Haney's bassett hound Cynthia.
  • Babylon 5. Sheridan/Delenn (human/Minbari-Human Hybrid), Lumati/alien business partners (Lumati/aliens of a different species that they make deals with, because sex is the Lumati handshake), G'Kar/multiple prostitutes (Narn/Humans/Centauri/God-only-knows-what-else), porn-star/Pak'mara porn-star (please don't make us spell it out).
    • Ivanova has tons of fun with the Lumati after stressing about it. They tell her next time, they'll do it their way.
  • Joss Whedon examples:
    • Buffy and Angel, Buffy and Spike: human/vampire.
    • Cordelia and Angel: "augmented human"/vampire.
    • Cordelia and Connor: different type "augmented human".
    • Cordelia and Doyle: human/half-demon.
    • Cordelia and Groosalugg: "augmented human"/human-demon hybrid.
    • Darla and Angel: human/vampire, for a very short time in season two.
    • Willow and Oz: human/werewolf.
    • Buffy and the Immortal (false rumor started by Andrew): human/sort-of-demon-ish guy...thing?.
    • The Immortal and Darla and Drusilla: immortal "human"?/vampire/vampire.
    • Jasmine in Cordelia's body and The Beast: higher power/demon.
    • Angel and Nina: vampire/werewolf.
    • Marcus Hamilton/Harmony: human-like creature/vampire.
    • Willow/Saga Vasuki: human/demon.
    • Dawn and Kenny: human (technically)/demon. Yeah, check out the Jo Chen cover for issue 25 to meet all your daily Squick requirements. There are tentacles.
    • Xander's tendency to date girls who are secretly demons was something of a Running Gag. It got to the point that he got suspicious if a girl seemed to like him.
  • Farscape: D'Argo gets a lot of this. A Luxan, he was married (and had a child with) a Sebacean (human-offshoot); had a long-running romance with Chiana (a Gray Skinned Space Babe); thought about Jool (an Interion); and admitted planning on "approaching" Zhaan (human-looking plant) in one episode. And this doesn't begin to cover innuendo with random denizens of Adventure Planets.
    • Then there was John Crichton's brief pairing with Zhaan. It's debatable if this applies to his relationships with Aeryn Sun or Gilina Renaez, considering how closely related Humans and Sebaceans are, Sebaceans being a sub-race of Humans, genetically altered by the Eidelons.
      • They definitely count since Sebaceans have some very Bizarre Alien Biology.
      • Don't forget John Crichton's encounter with Chiana in the past.
    • And all of this in a verse where cross species breeding is possible and illegal.
      • It's not illegal. Peacekeepers are the only ones forbidden from interspecies romances. Well, they're the only ones mentioned in the show.
    • Scorpius (Sebacean/Scarran hybrd) had relationships with Natira, an alien of unknown origin, seemed to flirt with random aliens of the week (M'Lee, Ro'Na), had a relationshop with Sikozu, a Kalish and a bioloid, not to mention all the Ho Yay with Crichton and Braca...
    • Not to mention Moya's offspring (living spaceship/regular spaceship), though that was less "romance" and more "mad science experiment".
  • Captain Jack and the insect woman Chantho in the Doctor Who episode "Utopia". That actually went nowhere, though, because she was already in love with Sir Derek Jacobi. Heck, Captain Jack and other people from his time period (the 51st Century) embody this trope.
    • Anyone falling for the Doctor, though he's a Human Alien (at least externally.)
    • Astrid and Bannakaffalatta from "Voyage of the Damned" count for this trope, too.
    • Branningan (cat person) and his human wife, Valerie, in "Gridlock".
    • The fourth series also gives us Lady Eddison and her long ago love affair with a giant sentient wasp in "The Unicorn and the Wasp". Though he did have a human form.
    • Ahem. The Doctor and Rose (and whoever else has a crush on him).
    • The Doctor states that this sort of thing becomes quite common in the future, when humans have contact with many alien species. He implies that Captain Jack's versatility is actually the norm.
    • The Master and Lucy Saxon, his wife. Time Lord/Human.
    • Also Leela (future human) and Andred (Time Lord) in "The Invasion of Time".
    • Susan Foreman (possible Time Lord) and David Campbell (human) in "The Dalek Invasion of Earth". Later Doctor Who Expanded Universe stories disagree as to whether this relationship was compatible.
    • It's implied in "The Ultimate Foe" that Peri (human) and KING YCRANOS!! ((Krontep warrior, whatever that is) live happily ever after together.
    • As of The Doctor's Wife, we have Time Lord/TARDIS confirmed.
    • "A Good Man Goes To War" gives us an LGBT example with Vastra and Jenny - a crimefighting, katana-wielding, same-sex Silurian / human couple in Victorian England. If that's not enough for you, the Silurian ate Jack the Ripper in an Offscreen Moment of Awesome
      • Neil Gaiman thinks Madame Vastra should act as well as solve crimes. Then she'd be a "Victorian Silurian Lesbian Thespian."
  • Torchwood's Tosh and "Mary" (in "Greeks Bearing Gifts").
  • Battlestar Galactica has
    • Baltar and the "Six" in his head (human and angel)
    • Caprica Six and the "Baltar" in her head (Cylon and angel)
    • Helo and Athena (human and Cylon)
    • Cally and Tyrol (human and Cylon)
    • Starbuck and Anders (human/angel and Cylon)
    • Leoben (Cylon) is a Stalker with a Crush for Starbuck (human/angel)
    • Cain and Gina Six (human and Cylon)
    • And to save space, Baltar (human) has been with the following Cylons: Caprica Six, Gina Six, D'Anna, Tory, and Lida Six.
    • Boomer and Tyrol seemed to be one at first, but then Tyrol proved to be a Tomato in the Mirror, making it a Same Species Romance between two Cylons.
  • Kirk and every Space Babe, Green Skinned or otherwise, ever. As a rule, Star Trek doesn't even blink over interspecies sex. Case in point, Mr. Spock's parents, the Vulcan Sarek and the Human Amanda are never depicted as anything but happily married.
    • Sarek's third wife (Amanda being the second) was also human; some fans think Sarek had a human-fetish.
    • Subsequent Star Trek series include several other notable hybrid characters, including Deanna Troi (Human/Betazoid); K'Ehleyr (Human/Klingon), who herself had a child with a Klingon; Ba'el (Klingon/Romulan); Sela (Human/Romulan) in Star Trek: The Next Generation; Ziyal (Bajoran/Cardassian) in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine; Naomi Wildman (Human/Katarian) and B'Elanna Tores (Human/Klingon) in Star Trek: Voyager.
    • In "Requiem for Methusaleh", Kirk falls in love with a woman who turns out to be an android, but it does not change his feelings.
    • Spock himself and Leila Kalomi, in "This Side of Paradise". He is forced by the spores into confronting his human feelings and tells her "I do love you".
    • Spock also fell in love and had a sexual relationship with another non-Vulcan woman, in "All Our Yesterdays". In addition, a number of human or at least non-Vulcan women showed an interest in Spock at some point, including Nurse Chapel (desperately in love with him), Lt. Uhura (flirted with him in a couple of episodes) and Droxine, a human-looking princess from an alien planet in the episode Cloud Minders. His relationship with the Romulan Commander The Enterprise Incident), as well, although Vulcans and Romulans are an offshot of the same species (and a fairly recent offshoot at that, especially given how long both species live), so that might not count.
    • Furthermore, in the 2009 film, young Spock has a romantic relationship with Uhura in the alternate timeline while Kirk, unsurprisingly, has a fling with Gaila, a green-skinned cadet from Orion.
      • Well, Spock and any human might not count - he's half human already, so it would be as valid a choice as having a Vulcan love interest. His parents surely would, though.
    • Star Trek: The Next Generation:
      • Tasha Yar had a one-night stand with a "fully-functional" android, Data.
      • Let's not forget alternate timeline Tasha Yar's daughter, half human/half Romulan.
      • Riker never seems to be interested in any female unless she is extraterrestrial, and apparently is irresistible to all of them. Good thing the show ended before he got around to the Horta; that acid's a bitch to clean off.
      • Discussed in "Timescape" where Troi relates how a Ktarian scientist (who called her "Diane") tried to hit on her by inviting her to join him in "empirical research" for his work on interspecies mating rituals.
    • Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
      • The series as a whole had several interspecies romances and even marriages between the main and recurring characters: Jadzia Dax and Worf (Joined Trill/Klingon), Kira Nerys and Odo (Bajoran/Changeling), Rom and Leeta (Ferengi and Bajoran), Ezri Dax and Bashir (Joined Trill/Human) and a recurring mixed species character Ziyal, the daughter of the Cardassian baddie Dukat and one of his Bajoran mistresses.
      • And perhaps the most extreme example, Ben Sisko was half human, half god.
      • Dukat (Cardassian) seemed obsessed with courting Kira (Bajoran) but nothing ever happened between them for the minor inconvenience of her being unwilling to date a member of a race that had enslaved and killed millions of her people. (Read: she despised him.)
      • Rom (Ferengi) and Leeta (Bajoran), still Happily Married as of season four of Star Trek: Lower Decks.
    • Star Trek: Voyager:
      • B'Elanna Torres often comments that her childhood was not a happy one, because her father "Couldn't handle living with one Klingon, let alone two".
      • Kes (Ocampa) and Neelix (Talaxian) had a relationship for a while (Neelix had rescued Kes from a life of slavery on Kazon). They later broke up because Neelix was being too overprotective, and Kes' last contribution to the crew (where she uses her Psychic Powers to hurl Voyager and its crew safely beyond Borg space, 9,500 light-years closer to Earth) pretty much ruins any chance of them getting back together. Of course, given that Ocampa typically only live about nine years, it likely would have been a Mayfly-December Romance if it had worked out.
      • Neleex also had a fling with a Klingon woman in "Prophecy" to prevent her from raping Kim - Klingon women have a hard time accepting "No" from men they take a liking to...
      • Kes and Tom Paris (Human) also are a couple in a parallel time line where the two have a daughter and a grandson.
      • The perils of this are explored in "The Disease" when Harry Kim has a passionate affair with an alien woman without checking with his doctor first. No, he doesn't get an alien STD - the disease is love. Unfortunately the attraction is not only emotional but biological as well. Plus Harry's skin tends to glow, which must make sex in the dark easier but seriously squicks his friends. Harry should have known better though. In "Favorite Son" a race of sexy space vampires try to suck out all his DNA - as they have few males it's the only way they get enough genetic material to continue their species. And Q is constantly pursuing Janeway, but while he promises that foreplay with a Q can last for decades it appears the actual act only lasts a second to the outside observer ("The Q and the Grey").
    • To really put the cherry on top, Cryptic Studios is advertising their extensive character creation process as "creating your own unique species," complete with optional origins story a la City of Heroes and Champions Online. Given that Cryptic is advertising to Trekkers on one hand and your typical MMO nerd (which inevitably includes the average 4channer) on the other, expect this trope to boldly go where no trope has gone before.
    • And to put a cherry on top of the cherry on top, we have a Fanon example: the Kirk/Spock Ship. Of course, Spock is already half human.
    • Star Trek: Enterprise:
      • Seeing as humans had only been in contact with extraterrestrials for less than a century and sometimes still get squicked over the idea of romancing them, it didn't happen as often. But this didn't stop Reed and Trip from being distracted in the first episode by a pair of alien dancing girls, and no less than three human crewmembers (Reed, Archer, and finally Trip for the win) from drooling over T'Pol at some point or another.
      • We can note that all the character development she got from the writers until the finding of the Kir'Shara in fourth season tended to make her more emotional and more Human. It helps to involve a supposedly emotionless Vulcan in a romantic relashionship.
      • In the plans for the cancelled fifth season, there was talk of T'Pol being half Romulan.
      • It is also hinted in Enterprise that even farther in the future, the 30th century, interspecies relations probably became very commonplace. The time traveler Daniels mentions that he is "human, more or less" implying that he may have some alien blood in him.
        • The body of another time traveler whose trip didn't go so well was also examined and found to be a hybrid of numerous species, including human, Vulcan, Rigellian and Terrelian.
      • The episode "Dear Doctor" had a female human (Crewman Cutler) getting interested in Denobulan doctor Phlox. Whether his sixteen-inch tongue is part of the appeal was not mentioned, but the good doctor did caution her on the cultural differences of his species (Denobulan males are somewhat inhibited, but on the other hand have polygamous marriages - Phlox has three wives who each have two other husbands). Likewise Trip is squicked out when one of Phlox's wives puts the moves on him and Phlox is excited rather than annoyed.
    • For a more literary reference, the series Star Trek: New Frontier manages to get no less than THREE cross-breed offspring on the same ship - a Vulcan/Romulan (not improbable, as the Romulans and Vulcans are related races who split only two thousand years ago), a Vulcan/Hermat, (where a Hermat is a hermaphroditic and rather sexually liberal race), and a Hermat/Human (actually not, as the Hermat was playing a practical joke on the human). It should be noted that there is only ONE Hermat in the crew. There was also the potential for a Vulcan/Xenexian cross, but it did not come about. A Human/Xenexian relationship (or rather several), a Human/Thallonian, and a Xenexian/Thallonian did indeed occur though. And some that were probably forgotten.
    • Of course, whether the Vulcan/Romulan example is a proper example of this trope, given that they are at least as genetically close as the Sebacean example in Farscape, if not more, is somewhat debatable...
    • Star Trek's philosophical attitude towards interspecies relations meant that Beverly Crusher's tragic romance with the joined Trill Odan came rather out of left field; she couldn't deal with the host changing bodies so frequently, no matter how much she loved him.
      • Retroactively justified, as changing hosts does tend to change the personality of the bonded Trill, making for an unstable relationship at best. But we don't learn that until years after the Odan story.
      • It also eventually comes out that Trill society strongly objects to 'reassociation' between a host and a person the symbiont's previous host had an intimate relationship with, to the extent that it can result in an effective death sentence for the symbiont.
  • Tokusou Sentai Dekaranger has Doggie Cruger, an anthropomorphic dog, who has feelings for his subordinate, the half-human half-swan person Swan Shiratori (whose own parents must have fit this trope). This plot element wasn't retained when Dekaranger was adapted into Power Rangers SPD and Cruger's counterpart was married to a new character of his own species (though there are a few hints that Swan's counterpart Kat does have feelings for Kruger).
    • The next series, Magiranger, has the Rangers as Half Human Hybrids, part human and part Sky Saint/Heavenly Saint. This is underplayed, though. Also, Urara winds up paired with another Saint, Hikaru.
  • Magiranger's Power Rangers counterpart, Power Rangers Mystic Force, has several interspecies Last Minute Hookups, such as Leelee and Phineas (Vampire (or at least born from a vampire if not one herself) and troll/goblin hybrid), Toby and Necrolai (human and (ex-?)vampire), Madison and Nick (human and Human Alien from mystic dimension), with a little subtext between Daggeron and Itassis (mystic Human Alien and the highest-ranking demon now that the Big Bad is gone) for flavor.
    • It was present as early as Power Rangers Zeo, when Billy chose to stay on Aquitar because he had fallen in love with Cestria (the Pink Aquator Ranger) who helped him find a cure for his aging disease. Notable in that she was amphibious, and he was actively choosing to live long-term on a planet where most all life goes on underwater. Billy, despite being a blue ranger, does not breathe water. Hey, Love Makes You Crazy.
    • A rather bizarre and unnerving example on an episode of Power Rangers Turbo where the Monster of the Week could inflict a Baleful Polymorph curse on a victim, but had terrible aim, missing Cassie and hitting her dog, Jetson, resulting in Jetson becoming human. Calling himself "Jethro" he seemed to have something of a crush on Cassie, and was more than a little upset when he realized the change was wearing off. Granted, it didn't go further than casual dating, but still kind of creepy.
    • Chad (human) falls in love with Merina (mermaid) in Power Rangers Lightspeed Rescue (episodes Ocean Blue and Neptune's Daughter).
  • A weird one is revealed in Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger, although it actually relates to characters from Engine Sentai Go-onger. The Gokaigers' latest mecha, Machalcon, is apparently the son of Bear RV (obviously, a bear) and Speedor (a condor). Machalcon is a falcon. How exactly does Bear + Condor = Falcon?
  • Mork and Mindy.
  • The Muppet Show
    • The most well known example, of course, is Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy.
    • Also, Gonzo, whose species was unknown at the time but is now said to be some kind of alien has an attraction to birds, especially chickens, and in one case, a cow.
    • And in the cartoon spin-off, Muppet Babies, he's in love with Piggy. Camilla, is, alas, just a stuffed toy in that version.
    • The Muppets Take Manhattan contained this exchange:

Brooke Shields: Is something wrong?
Masterson Rat: Do you believe in interspecies dating?
Brooke Shields: Well, I've dated some rats before, if that's what you mean.

  • It got weirder in Muppet Treasure Island. Benjamina Gunn (Miss Piggy) apparently had relationships with the humans Captain Flint and Long John Silver, the former of whom abandoned her on the island after their relationship ended. Her former fiance Captain Smollett (Kermit) seemed disturbed by this revelation, but it may have been more because of her promiscuity than the interspecies aspect.
  • Piggy's been known to throw herself at hunky male humans on The Muppet Show before. Christoper Reeve comes to mind. Also Patrick Wilson, drummer for Weezer, in the "Keep Fishing" video. Neither one reciprocated. Charles Grodin, however, was quite enamoured with her in The Great Muppet Caper.
  • On The Muppets, Sam the Eagle has shown affection for the human-looking Janice, the guitarist in Dr. Teeth's band.
  • Kermit also had a crush on Linda Ronstadt when she appeared in the original show, his affection towards her causing Piggy to reach a near-Yandere level of obsession, locking him in a trunk that contained Gonzo's fungus collection. Linda actually tries to convince Kermit he's better off with Piggy, but Kermit's response is, "You may know that, and Piggy may know that, but the vote's not in yet from the frog."
  • Out of This World: Donna (Human) and Troy (Antarian), Troy is apparently a Human Alien, though the only time he actually appears "in person", he's a somewhat abstract ghostly form. For the rest of the series, he only "appears" by way of a communication cube, which the other characters often treat as though it actually physically is Troy.
  • Space Cases does this with the hinted feelings between Harlan and Catalina, Harlan and Suzee, Radu and Elmira, and Radu and Suzee. Granted as a kids show none of these went anywhere, but its still worth note. However excluding Elmira (who is a proper Green Skinned Space Teen) every alien in this series is a Human Alien. Also, aside from Radu, Suzee & Elmira, the other "aliens" are actually descended from genetically altered humans created to live on other planets in the solar system.
  • Tragically played with in the CSI episode "Fur and Loathing"; while all the characters involved are physically human, the victim was accidentally killed as an indirect result of his new flame's former boyfriend poisoning him with caster oil for stealing his girl... all on the basis of fursona species segregation (the victim was a raccoon, the girl a lamb, the boyfriend a wolf).
  • The centaurs in Xena: Warrior Princess (who are all male) and human women.
  • Hyperdrive. Hilariously spoofed in the compulsory sex education video watched before a First Contact mission. We don't see it (fortunately) but the crews' reactions to what they are watching show it would make even Kirk think twice.

"Let's learn about another Alien Sex Disease. This crewmember had intercourse with a Glygonthian octopoid. Let's take a close look at his genitals. Pustules have developed, and on the pustules: warts. Soon, his entire groin explodes, leaving five baby octopoids, each with his face. Remember, Alien Sex is Danger Sex."

  • This trope was the whole point of Beauty and The Beast!
  • Willy, the Woobie alien from V, and the human Harmony Moore had a genuine romance, unfortunately cut short by her death in the second TV movie.
  • The Daily Show did a short piece on a biologist claiming that humans are more closely related to orangutans or something. At the end, we see John Oliver and an orangutan doing all the romantic stuff, terminating with Oliver hanging a "Do Not Disturb" sign on his hotel room door.
  • Averted in The X-Files. Though various monster/human relationships are seen, when one character thinks that the reason an alien took human form was because he fell in love with an Earth woman, the alien just laughs (it turns out he fell in love with baseball. And laughter).
  • In Roswell, of course, Max, Michael and Isabel, who are bio-engineered human/alien hybrids have their human significant others. It was never explained if they would eventually be able to have children though it was implied in the tie-in books that Max and Liz would have two children in the future. Zan, Max and Tess' offspring shouldn't count since both Max and Tess are hybrids of the same kind.
  • In Alien Nation, an on-again-off-again romance develops between human cop Matthew Sykes and Newcomer Cathy Frankel.
  • Revealed in a flashback in The Event, between the Human Alien Simon Lee and his human lover decades in the past. This could quite possibly be a Mayfly-December Romance, since we don't really have any idea just how old his people actually are.
  • Tracker implied it in Mel's backstory. According to the official character information, her grandfather was Cirronian.
  • Teen Wolf Scott and Allison (human/werewolf)
  • A big part of Steven Spielberg's Taken miniseries. Allie was the product of several generations of it.
  • Wizards of Waverly Place: Alex/Mason (wizard/werewolf), Justin/Rosie (wizard/angel) and Justin/Juliet (wizard/vampire).
    • In one episode, Justin dates a werewolf, and it's also mentioned that he dated a centaur before as well.
  • In one episode of Misfits, Kelly briefly dates a guy who turns out to have been a gorilla with the ability to shapeshift into human form.
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