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Why Would Anyone Take Him Back?: Difference between revisions
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This trope is often matched up with [[Love Martyr]] and/or [[All Take and No Give]]. Very much a defining feature of the [[Lifetime Movie of the Week]] brand of entertainment.
A sister trope to [[No Accounting for Taste]]. See also [[What Does She See in Him?]]. For when there's a much better suitor involved, see [[Derailing Love Interests]].
{{examples
== Anime and Manga ==
* ''[[Hot Gimmick]]'' with Ryoki and Hatsumi's relationship. They break up and get back together countless times. It mostly ends with Ryoki going to Hatsumi, demanding her to ask for forgiveness and tell him she wants to become his girlfriend again. Which she does each time, without fail. This is also the reason why so many fans hated the ending to the point where [[
* At the end of the ''[[Area 88]]'' manga, {{spoiler|Ryoko and Shin reunite, after Shin has repeatedly broken Ryoko's heart.}} Then again, this ''is'' [[Love Martyr|Ryoko]] [[Wide Eyed Idealist|we're]] [[Wrong Genre Savvy|talking]] [[Love Makes You Dumb|about.]]
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* Arguably the heroine of ''[[The Devil Wears Prada]]'' should not have taken back her boyfriend - or indeed her entire group of friends. It's worse in that she's presented as being in the wrong all along while they treated her work commitments (and her daring to speak to a man that wasn't her boyfriend) as a personal betrayal. While it is somewhat justifiable that she probably didn't need to obsess over her job to the point that she was even blowing off an evening with her father to book Miranda a flight out of Miami in a hurricane, her friends generally berated and abused her for even attempting to stay employed - in New York City no less. Note that her boyfriend, as a chef, would likely be working the same crazy unpredictable hours as well, so this just comes off as a [[Double Standard]]. Not to mention that incredibly dicky bit where she gives them all that nice stuff and they pay her back by stealing her phone when she's taking a work call. Thanks, guys. Ironically, in the book, her friends were much more sympathetic - and one of them actually ''encouraged'' her to talk to the guy.
* ''Failure To Launch'' is a rare [[Gender Flip]] version; the man is expected to take back his girlfriend, even though said girl had only pretended to be in love with him to drive him out of his parents' home (see, if you boost a man's self-esteem by dating him, he'll start doing things for himself and it'll stick even if you dump him later on) and he's understandably ''pissed'' when he finds out.
* ''[[Hitch]]'' has the reporter, who spends most of the film trying to expose the title's "Date Doctor" while (unknowingly) going out with him. She ends up exposing him, destroying his anonymity and business, and almost destroys another relationship. She does so under the misguided belief that Hitch only helped jerks get laid based on ''one'' incident where she only had half the facts (the jerk acted on his own) where a friend of hers got hurt, proving she is a lousy, not to mention unethical, reporter; you don't write a story with one viewpoint, and you don't write a story you're ''personally involved in''. All of which [[What the Hell, Hero?|Hitch calls her out on]], as well women like her making dating impossible for ordinary guys. Although she later gives him a heartfelt apology, Hitch very deservedly refuses to accept it. What should have turned out to be a Crowning Moment of Awesome, ends in a major cliche--when Hitch later ''goes to her door to beg for her forgiveness!'' And after that she responds to his begging for forgiveness by basically just deliberately jerking him around for awhile. Just for her own sadistic amusement. It's only after she further breaks his heart and makes him plead a bit more that she finally takes him back.
* The film ''Life/Drawing''. Mark Ruffalo's 'hero', a struggling artist is a complete ass to the female lead when they are together, being patronising, insulting and indifferent/hostile to her life and beliefs as a member of the USAF while she tries to take an interest in his - her worst and only crime is being [[Book Dumb]] and (mildly) [[The Ditz|ditzy]].
* ''Over Her Dead Body'' is another [[Gender Flip]]. Note in both this and ''Failure to Launch'' (and ''Hitch'' for that matter) the female lead ''explicitly'' sets out to deceive the male lead.
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* ''[[Much Ado About Nothing (Theatre)|Much Ado About Nothing]]'''s (allegedly) main plot has Claudio, with no faith in Hero and only the most superficial idea of love for her, but their reconciliation is meant to be a good thing anyway. After the Friar's speech, though, the Friar-suggested [[Zany Scheme]] goes into full effect and Claudio realizes that he truly did love Hero to the point where he happily takes her back in the finale. Much of this trope is invoked if Claudio overplays the pivotal moments in Act 4, Scene 1 - if he's being a [[Jerkass]] there, it's understandable, but if he's playing a deceived man who shall punish himself further, then it averts this trope. Definitely a case of the actor portraying Claudio providing [[Your Mileage May Vary]].
** The BBC series ''Shakespeare Re-told'' didn't change that much of the politically incorrect ''[[The Taming of the Shrew (Theatre)|The Taming of the Shrew]]'', they did change the ending of their adaptation of ''Much Ado About Nothing'' because the way Claudio attacks Hero and shames her in front of her family is [[Moral Event Horizon|really beyond the pale]]. Specifically, Hero ''doesn't'' take Claude back after he humiliates her in front of her friends and family.
* ''[[
* Averted in Ibsen's ''[[A Dolls House (Theatre)|A Dolls House]]'', in which after the conflict is settled, the lead character recognizes her husband's poor character and leaves him. This only happened because Ibsen was forced to change the ending for some German productions because people didn't like the first one. The changed ending has Nora fighting with her husband and is then led to her children, where she collapses and decides to stay, playing this trope straight, but as some protest demonstrated, at least one troupe reverted to the original.
* At the end of ''[[The Marriage of Figaro (Theatre)|The Marriage of Figaro]]'', after the Count has been shown up by Figaro, Susanna and the Countess, he asks his wife to forgive him. She does. This despite the fact that:
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** And please, let's ''not'' forget that whole section in act two where he was trying to find out who was in the Countess's wardrobe, and calls her a ''lot'' of unpleasant names in the process as well as threatening to scrag her relatively innocent godson. Yes, he had a reason for it, and he does apologise for that one at the time, but that doesn't do much to excuse his behaviour (in one production he even hits her!).
** All this means she'd be perfectly within her rights to have him dance the humiliation conga some more, but because she's 'kinder than him' she forgives him almost right off the bat, and admittedly the music makes it a [[Crowning Moment of Heartwarming]]. (One only wonders how long he's going to stay faithful ''this'' time...)
* In ''[[A Streetcar Named Desire]]'', Stella runs off from Stanley after he beats her up, however, seconds after ''[[Signature Scene|that]]'' scene, she runs back to him. Blanche calls her out for it and even asks her [[What Does She See in Him?|what she sees in him]]. It's been implied that this happened several times. The Film subverts it as in the end, she runs off from Stanley after what he did to Blanche.
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== Western Animation ==
* ''[[The Simpsons (Animation)|The Simpsons]]'': Any episode where Marge considers leaving Homer only to take him back. A memorable incident is is "The War of the Simpsons" when they go to a marriage retreat and Marge has a [[Long List]] of her husband's faults and even Rev. Lovejoy agrees with her. Homer throws back the fish he caught and that is enough to make up for everything else, as the two happily head home. This was ''seasons'' before he became a [[Jerkass]]. While the fish was meant to be a symbol that he actually ''did'' love her more than anything else, the example still holds up. It also goes both ways. Marge has repeatedly done things to Homer that show her to be petty and vindictive, and with a bit of a wandering heart/eye.
** [[The Movie]] has Homer's selfish behavior finally catch up with him, with Marge taking the kids and leaving, even recording a [[Dear John Letter|"Dear John" message]] ''over the video of their wedding''. However, Homer [[My God, What Have I Done?|realizes what he's done]] and race to win back Marge's love by proving that he really does care about more than just himself.
** Then there's Apu and Manjula. In her first episode it looks like they have a [[Perfectly Arranged Marriage]]. Then they have eight babies, which is understandably stressful. But Apu cheats on her because they'd become distant due to the stress of raising their children, which caused them both to act in ways that were unacceptable and detrimental to their relationship. When the affair is discovered it's a wonder either of them takes the other back, all of which is [[Hilarious in Hindsight|Something I]][[Harsher in Hindsight|n Hindsight]] when you again recall that first episode, where Manjula herself says "If it doesn't work out, we can always get a divorce."
* Duncan to Courtney in [[Total Drama Action]] and then vise versa in ''World Tour''.
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