First round post here, second round post here, the quarter-finals here.

Oh things are getting interesting now 🙂 🙂

Please go and see @purlturtle’s semi-final post here.

We got two match-ups!

Fighting for glory and honour to the left is *drum roll*

Second Chances vs. Soulmates

aaaaaaand over on the right we have

Mistaken Identity vs Friends to Lovers

Oh dear, oh dear, how can there possibly be a victor with such impossible brackets???

Under the cut because of course it is 🙂 🙂

Second Chances vs. Soulmates
Really two goliaths, how can there be a winner? Because there has to be. As mentioned in previous brackets there’s no point to this game if a choice doesn’t have to be made. One must win, therefore one must lose.

I’m not too sure what I can say about either that I haven’t already mentioned on the previous rounds. The reason I feel the choice is so difficult is because they tap into a similar energy for me – real love is hard, it’s waking up and choosing love every day. Relationships aren’t easy, they take work, and so sometimes the love might not be easy to find – that’s why love is a choice.

So is it “this could be your future but only if you put in the work” or is it “we let what we had slip through our fingers once, I’ll be damned if I’m not going to fight for it this time”. Tough, tough choice.

In the end I think I have to go with Soulmates. Because while Second Chance is incredible it’s also fraught. Certainly in real life if people split up it’s usually for a good reason. If it didn’t work the first time, it’s unlikely to the second. Now that take is simplistic because people can grow and obviously it also very much depends on why they split up in the first place. Plus these are fictional tropes and I can’t nitpick Second Chances for being unrealistic because hello soulmates – that’s by definition a fantasy thing! I think it’s more the potential for misery though. Although I suppose if somebody gets told their soulmate is someone who is actually bad for them, then it can be ‘doomed by the narrative’ as they lock themselves into a miserable life ‘because it’s fate’ and that sucks too.

(in which I’m talking myself out of the choice. really it can be argued both ways)

Also @purlturtle pointed out something I hadn’t considered today – that maybe some tropes are more suited for queer romances. I was responding to the tropes purely as me – a writer, a shipper. I wasn’t differentiating between the type of relationship (as ha! love is love) but that is a good point.

None of us get out alive. In this messed up world there’s a lot of hate 🙁 and while I can’t speak for anyone but me I know I’ve internalised some of it. It’s easy to be compassionate for others, but much less so not to self-direct that hate. So with queer romances maybe even more than het ones, I guess it’s possible for people to have too much shit they got to unlearn before they are ready. Thus making Second Chances even more vital. Ok changed my mind!

WINNER – Second Chances

Mistaken Identity vs Friends to Lovers
Ok all along I think I’ve been stretching the definition of Mistaken Identity by making it more of a theme, so thus linking it to masks and acceptance. Still I don’t think that makes for an easy win for Friends to Lovers because well the very issue of identity is complex.

Can it mean undercover/espionage hijinks? Sure. Can it mean somebody thinking you are their blind date in a bar, but you’re not? Absolutely. It can mean all kinds of fun stuff! But couldn’t it also mean something more complex like assuming somebody is a certain gender of sexuality when they are not? Or maybe even somebody thinking that about themselves and then going “oh.” when they start to question.

Friends to Lovers is fundamental. I know relationships can take many forms but this is about me – what I write, what I ship – and all my ships are friends before anything else. I have gone back and forth over whether that fundamental nature makes it the ultimate trope, or whether because it needs more to make a story (another trope) it’s not competing in the same way. It is so, so hard to judge. On some brackets in past rounds I have decided one way, and on others I’ve had to give it the win. This time?

WINNER: Mistaken Identity

But I don’t feel good about it.

My brain feels like a pretzel. So, so hard, but choices have been made and the final is nearly upon us!