May-December Romance/Playing With
Basic Trope: There is a significant age difference between the partners in a romantic couple.
- Straight: Alice is 25, Bob is 45.
- Exaggerated: Bob is 18, Alice is 81.
- Bob is a baby and Alice is 122.
- See also Mayfly-December Romance.
- Justified: Bob and Alice live in a culture where men don't marry until they're financially secure, but women marry young to improve their chances of safe childbirth.
- Bob has a fetish for much older women.
- A royal Arranged Marriage.
- Alice is a Gold Digger and Bob is a wealthy man.
- Alice is actually 43, but through some means, looks a lot younger than she really is.
- They really do love each other.
- Inverted: Romantic partners are as close in age as possible.
- Subverted: Alice may look twenty years younger than Bob, but she's Really Seven Hundred Years Old.
- Double Subverted: Then it turns out Bob is Over Nine Thousand years old.
- Parodied: The bride hasn't even hit puberty yet, and the groom is Older Than Dirt.
- Deconstructed: The generational differences between Alice and Bob cause strain in their relationship, and they eventually break up to seek partners closer to their own ages.
- Reconstructed: But Ted and Carol, despite their age difference, find enough in common that their love can survive misunderstandings, and form a stronger bond because of it.
- Alternately, the only significant difference is their age. For example, the May is noted to be more emotionally mature than her peers, or the December is a Cool Old Person.
- Zig Zagged: ???
- Averted: No one in the story dates outside their own age category.
- Enforced: "Our male lead, Bob Oldguy, is a box-office hit even in his fifties, but we need a younger actress for the female lead to sell the merchandise. How about Alice Ingenue?"
- Lampshaded: "Isn't she a bit young for you?"
- Invoked: Fortyish Bob takes classes at the local college in hopes of scoring with sorority girls by flaunting his superior breadwinning skills.
- Defied: Bob decides not to go out with the much younger Alice after all; it's more sensible to stick with women of his own maturity level.
- Discussed: "What you want to do, Alice, is look for an older man. The young ones haven't matured enough to be interesting for more than sex."
- Or, conversely: "What you want to do, Bob, is look for an older girl. The girls your own age are too immature, and only want to date jocks and bad boys."
- Conversed: "I hope I can still get the young women when I'm Bob Oldguy's age. Did you see the girl they matched him with in his latest film?"
Back to May-December Romance, you crazy kids and/or senior citizens, you.