Sickeningly Sweethearts

How adorable. Somebody get me a gun.

Marriage Counselor: Mr. and Mrs. Drebin, please - I'm diabetic.

—The Naked Gun 33 ⅓

Some marriages are painful, others are dead, a few are happy, and then there are those which are... cute.

They use pet names even Fluffy the Terrible winces at, cuddle incessantly, never argue (unless you count their "you're cuter" exchanges as such) and basically turn all nearby salt into sugar.

Usually, they're as indestructibly upbeat as you think. Other times, the show will delight in giving them one tiny imperfection, problem, or Single-Issue Wonk that makes them turn into The Masochism Tango.

In anime, these are often referred to as a "bakappuru" (portmanteau of "Baka" and "couple") or stupid couple by other characters annoyed by their loveydovey antics. See also Glurge Addict.

A Sister Trope to Make-Out Kids, when a couple makes others feel uncomfortable by being very affectionate in public.

Examples of Sickeningly Sweethearts include:

Anime & Manga

• In Fullmetal Alchemist, Hughes has this kind of extreme affection for his wife Gracia and his daughter Elicia, but perhaps atypically, it makes him really likeable rather than annoying. It helps that he's a pretty Badass Knife Nut.
  • In the manga, Sig and Izumi Curtis (of all people) are so lovey-dovey that they traumatized Ed and Al when they were kids. They hang on each other, invoke sparkly backgrounds, had a Meet Cute involving a bear carcass, and frequently kick ass together while cooing at each other. Go figure.
• Chet and Addy in Haré+ Guu. Even the romantically-minded Marie refers to them as "Chetttttt" and "Addyyyyyy".
  • It's mentioned that every once a Month Adi gets into a fight with Chet over the stupidest things. But always gets back together with him after he says some sappy line.
• Kazuya and Akane at the end of My-HiME, possibly to balance that out their counterparts put in an impossible position in Mai-Otome.
• Umi's parents in Magic Knight Rayearth are more than Happily Married. They take any excuse to fawn and coo all over each other. Even Umi herself is thoroughly disgusted by their incessant, diabetes-inducing displays of affection and refers to it as "the perpetual honeymoon".
• Similarly, Mimi's parents in Digimon Adventure.
• In Infinite Ryvius, Lilith and Emerson, to the point where they're nicknamed the "Love Love Couple". However, they slowly grow apart over the course of the series.
• Pedro from Excel Saga had this kind of relationship with his family... until everything went horribly wrong.
• In Gals!, Ran and Tatsuki call themselves a stupid couple
• In School Days, Makoto and Sekai are called a stupid couple by Hikari.
• Kanade and Yukino from Candy Boy. Yes, they're both girls. They are also fraternal twin sisters.
• Honoka and Ginji Kawai in Magical Project S.
• Noriko and Shimako from Mariasama ga Miteru, which leads to some mild teasing by the other girls of the student council.
• Tokyo Mew Mew: Ichigo's parents couldn't be lovey-dovier if they tried.
• Hayashi and Morimoto from Godannar seem to exist only for comic relief and to annoy characters with less-than-perfect relationships. At least until the Distant Finale, where Hayashi is revealed as Chekhov's Gunman
• Lovely Complex: Nakao and Ishihara fit this perfectly.
• From Vampire Knight, we have Yuuki's parents, Haruka and Juuri.
• Subverted in Durarara!!: Seiji Yagiri and his girlfriend Mika Harima look to everyone like Sickeningly Sweethearts that spend all their free time whispering sweet nothings into each other's ear... and then you actually hear what those sweet nothings are and realize that they're probably the most dysfunctional couple ever.

Seiji: I'm in love with the scars on your neck...

• • Just to make it clear, they're both utterly bug-duck crazy: Mika was Seji's stalker until he took a baseball bat to her skull for finding a decapitated head when she broke into his apartment. She got plastic surgery to look like Seiji's true love, making Seiji think Mika was said true love, and they got together. Then the truth came out, but the pair are so crazy they stick together anyway. Oh, and Seiji's true love was said previously mentioned decapitated head, which his incestuous big sister got rid of because she wanted one less rival for her brother's affections (but that's another story)... Did we mention they were crazy yet?
• Michi and Yoshirin, the young couple from Crayon Shin-chan, are a clear parody of this trope. Apart from occasional (and pretty dumb) break-ups, all they do on the series is be lovey-dovey with each other. At least on the original and Spanish dubs.
• Yuuki and Yume from Kanamemo, and not even Yuuki's jealousy or Yume's ditziness can put any dents in that.
• In an anime-only episode of Ranma ½, Ranma and Akane turn into this couple for an afternoon due to "love mushrooms". Made hilarious by lots of irony, jealous rivals, shippers on deck, and shenanigans all around.
  • In a different episode, Ranma and Akane pretend to be this type of couple to get Ukyo out of the Tendo household. Unfortunately for them, they've made a habit of arguing and find being lovey-dovey with each other a daunting task. But hey, it makes for good television!
• Ayano and Shimotakatani from High School Girls are constantly like this, to the disgust of Ayano's boyfriend-less friends.
• Himeno's father Kaoru and her (very wealthy) stepmother Natsue from Prétear, to the embarassment of their daughters.
• Yukio Ayashiro and his wife Noriko in a two-part episode of Detective Conan. It's a little more justified as they had just gotten married, tho. Their old friend and the local Private Defective Kogoro openly lampshades the trope:

Kogoro: Hey, you two! How long do you plan on keep playing cutesy?

• Tamahome! Miaka! Tamahome! Miaka! in Fushigi Yuugi.
• Shaman King has Faust and Eliza. When they're first introduced, it seems more like Love Makes You Evil or Mummies At the Dinner Table, but when Anna reunites them with her Itako powers, they definitely fit this trope. They even flirt during a major fight, and he carries her around Bridal Style while crossing a river.
• Katsuo and his wife in Yakitate!! Japan. Their cutesy gushing only helped to encourage Kuroyanagi to eliminate Katsuo in the semi-finals of one Tournament Arc.
• Eureka Seven: Count the times Eureka and Renton argue with each other, come on. That's right, 1. They argued once in a 50-episode show. And that scene lasted shorter than 1 minute.
• Uranborg and Arkangel from the BL manga "Yasashii Ryuu no Koroshikata" after their Relationship Upgrade. Most of it is Uru constantly fawning over Ark, declaring his love and unending devotion to his "pledged one", especially after they get together. When Ark finally reciprocates, he eats Uru's words up like candy when he isn't getting shy over it. Take a look. (Warning: Spoiler.)

Comics

• Apollo and The Midnighter from The Authority, surprisingly. They're very affectionate but will still rip out your spine if you make one of them mad and god forbid you actually harm one of them or their adopted daughter - you will wish you had never been born.
• Hourman and Liberty Belle in Justice Society of America. Thankfully, the lovey-dovey stuff doesn't get in the way of them kicking ass in battle.
• "Richandamy" from the comic strip Zits are a high school relationship taken all the way to symbiosis.
  • Amusingly, Richandamy were based on two college friends of creator Jim Borgman. They were actually named Rich and Amy, he was tall and she was short, and they practically were that inseparable. They're now Happily Married with three kids.
• Peter and Denise of FoxTrot were known to be like this from time to time. One occasion featured them in a rather sweet moment, in which Peter talked about how unbelievably great it was to finally have a girlfriend like her. "Just great?" she responds. "Okay, super-duper-ooper-great." "You're so cute." And then of course Jason and Marcus as spying on them behind a clump of bushes, causing Jason to whisper to him, "If I'm ever that cute, shoot me dead."
• One dialogue from Empowered: "No, you should wear that outfit (tee hee)!" - "No, you should wear that outfit (tee hee)!" No wonder the Caged Demonwolf imagines a scene with better dialogue, in his usual flowery style.
• In Monica's Gang: in the teenage spinoff, Monica and Jimmy Five abandon their normal personalities of Tsundere and Jerk with a Heart of Gold and become one of these when they finally start dating. This ends up disgusting the other characters so badly that many of them start to root explicitly for the breakup of the couple.
• Aang and Katara become this in Avatar: The Last Airbender - The Promise.

Film

• Winsor McCay had a couple like this in one of his early minor features.
• In Who Framed Roger Rabbit?, this proved to be Jessica and Roger's relationship.
• Spoofed in the movie The Naked Gun 33 ⅓: The Final Insult. While at marriage counseling, Frank and Jane start calling each other sappy pet names. At first the therapist smiles at the display, but after a few more he says "Mr. and Mrs. Drebin, I'm a diabetic. I think you two ought to go now."
• Googly-Bear and Schmootzy-Poo (aka Mike and Celia) in Monsters, Inc..
• In The Mummy Returns, whenever the Evelyn and Rick kiss, they'll get a disgusted look and the "Find yourself a room" comments from their son and/or Evelyn's brother Jonathan.
• In Antz, Chip and Muffy (the Cultural Posturing wasps).
  • This Troper cracked up at Chip referring to Muffy as "Cuddly Widdles" and "Wattling Kiddles".
• Barbie and Ken from Toy Story 3. Buzz makes a "you have got to be kidding me" facial expression after overhearing a conversation between them.
• The pair of robbers (Amanda Plummer and Tim Roth) at the end and beginning of Pulp Fiction are this. They're even credited as "Pumpkin" and "Honey Bunny."
• Parodied in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang in the song "Chu Chi Face." ^{[dead link]} (And you're my teddy bear. Together we're a Chu-Chi Woo-Chi, Ooo-Chi Coo-Chi Pair!) Of course, the entire time the king and queen are singing this to each other, he's trying to arrange an untimely death for her, resulting in her getting more and more nervous and uneasy as the song progresses.

Literature

• There's a character (Manilov) in Gogol's Dead Souls who shares with his wife a sickeningly sweet affection.
• Lavender and Ron in Harry Potter. On second thought, just Lavender.
  • "...if Ron was going to begin calling her 'Lav-Lav', he [Harry] would have to put his foot down."
  • Bill and Fleur fit this trope as well.
    • When contemplating the idea of Ron and Hermione getting together, Harry fears (among other things) that they might turn out like this, using Bill and Fleur as an example.
• Parodied in a book by Tom Holt, where a bickering couple are tricked into overdosing on love potion. They start using pet names at the end of every sentence but retain their normal personalities, leading to sentences like, "Don't be such a bloody idiot honey-bunny".
• Edward and Bella, Alice and Jasper, heck, just about every couple from Twilight.
  • Every vampire couple. The only human couples worth mentioning are either broken up (Bella's parents, Jessica and Mike), basically nonexistent (Angela and Ben), or barely begun by the end of the series (Charlie and whatsherface).
    • The werewolves and the girls that they imprint on. To the point in which the other wolves in the pack do not look forward to mindlinking with a wolf who had just been visiting his imprintee.
• In the second book of the Guardians of Ga'Hoole series, the Band comes across a pair of owls that do not give their names but refer to each other as Sweetums and Swatums. They preen each other and talk about eating sugar gliders while speaking to the group.
• In Salman Rushdie's Haroun and the Sea of Stories Prince Bolo and Princess Batcheat are like this, to the disgust of absolutely everyone around them. Bolo is so oblivious (and stupid) that he constantly praises the silly Batcheat for her beauty and her singing voice, both of which are described in detail as completely horrendous.
• Bingo Little and his wife, Rosie in the Jeeves and Wooster series. Bertie attributes this to the fact that Rosie is a romance novelist.

Live Action TV

• The "Soup Nazi" episode of Seinfeld where several of the characters in relationships had a sort of competition to be the most sickeningly sweet.
  • "You're shmoopy!" "No you're shmoopy!" George to Elaine: "I had to listen to them for 15 minutes arguing over which one of them was 'Shmoopy'."
• An episode of Caroline in the City had Caroline sitting in a diner waiting for a friend, and being forced to sit through a couples wuvvy-duvvy baby talk and nicknames for each other. When her friend finally shows up, she asks, "Who are they?" Caroline responds, in total deadpan, "Billy-Bear and Cindy-Doodle. Satan sent them."
• An episode of How I Met Your Mother has Barney and Britney Spears (not playing herself) pretend to be like this in order to make fun of Ted. Barney then proposes to her, but he thought it was part of the act and she thought it was for real.
  • When Ted and Robin were going out, they got Barney to do what they wanted once by threatening him with sickeningly sweet behaviour.
  • Lily and Marshall occasionally lapse into this.
• Danny and Lindsay on CSI: NY have been accused of this on occasion because of the back and forth comments and occasional flirting that come out when they're working together.
• Niles and Daphne of Frasier were like this for a while after they finally got together. One could argue that if you spend seven years pining after one girl you're allowed to be a little obnoxiously happy, the other characters was greatly relieved when the two got over this phase.
  • A later episode in the last season also has an interesting P.O.V based example; at one point, both Martin and Niles—both of whom are in happy, stable relationships, Martin about to get married again and Niles married with his first child on the way—sigh about how happy they are. From their perspective, it's merely a content but throwaway musing. Frasier, however, happens to be going through a particularly dismal time in his already pretty grim love life, so from his point-of-view, Martin and Niles are being insufferably smug and sneering about their good fortune.
• Lilly and Oliver in Hannah Montana, after being friends since kindergarten, suddenly turn into this, even calling each other "Lilypop" and "Ollypop".
• Buffy and Spike, when one of Willow's accidental spells made them want to get married, treated each other like this.
• True Blood: Hoyt and Jessica in Season 2, until after enduring hours of abuse from his mother, Jessica quite justifiably snaps and snacks on Maxine's juicy jugular, thereby pushing Hoyt's Relative Button.
  • To a lesser degree, Sookie and Bill.
• In the "Howling Wind" episode of Cirque Du Soleil's Widget Series Solstrom, a newlywed couple is soooooooooooo in love with each other that neither notices that the honeymoon hotel they've just checked into has been magically transformed into a Gothic Hell Hotel. In the end they become happily-in-love vampires.
• Sweets and Daisy from Bones. She calls him "Lancelot" (his first name is at least Lance, so it's an understandable nickname). They're going to get married. Maybe that'll calm them down. I doubt it, somehow. It still makes you smile, even as you're trying not to vomit, because they're so matchingly dysfunctional.

Daisy: Bye, Lancelot! Colon, end bracket, colon, capital D!
Sweets: Semi-colon, end parenthesis, less than sign, numeral 3!!
Daisy: Colon, capital P!
Cam: Oh, dear God. I'm going to yak.

• A couple in an early episode of 7th Heaven was this trope personified until the husband confessed to his wife that he'd never properly divorced his first wife. Much angst and screaming ensued and it was up to Eric to save the day.
• On an episode of Everybody Loves Raymond, Ray and Debra go to Vermont to stay at a bed-and-breakfast for the weekend, and end up across the hall from a sickeningly sweet couple (who have only been dating for 6 weeks) who can't stop giggling and making sexual innuendos at each other. Ray and Debra stare in disbelief at this behavior. At one point, Ray and Debra are outside their room, when they hear the other couple (thanks to their obnoxiously loud giggling) and actually rush to find their keys to get into their room before the couple can turn the corner and talk to them.
  • In another episode, Robert and Amy are acting like this shortly after getting married, which Ray and Debra don't mind too much — until Robert and Amy start giving Ray and Debra marriage advice. Ray and Debra, who have been comfortably married for over a decade, don't appreciate getting advice from newlyweds (or in Ray's words, from "the guy who married a stripper, then divorced a stripper, then married a regular person, then hung in there for three whole months"), or Robert and Amy's insistence that their marriage is "unhappy" because they don't behave like this trope anymore.
• On That '70s Show the relationship between Jackie and Hyde makes Eric feel uncomfortable at first, despite being nothing like this:

Hyde: (on the phone with Jackie) Whatever. Whatever. Yeah, like I care. All right, I'll talk to you later, Jackie. (hangs up)
Eric: Eww! Do you mind not getting all gooey and romantic when I'm about to eat my breakfast?

• Chuck's Alex and Morgan are one of the best example of this trope on television.
• Applies (at first glance) to any relationship on Pushing Daisies, with the exception of those involving Emerson Cod.
• Kayley and Simon were starting to show signs of this before Firefly was canceled.
• An odd example from Community. Jeff begins acting this way to Britta so that the school stops hating him. Then they both get into a bizarre competition of who can be the most nauseatingly romantic.
• On 3rd Rock from the Sun, Dick and Mary are like this whenever their on-off relationship is "on", to the great annoyance of the other Solomons and occasionally also Nina.

Music

• Mocked in the Irving Berlin song "Snooky Ookums".
• The whole point of the song "Lucky" by Jason Mraz and Colbie Caillat.
• Mocked in the song "Mon coeur mon amour" ("My heart my love") by French singer Anaïs.
• "Disgustingly In Love" by Mitch Benn.

Video Games

• Phoenix plays one-half of this equation in the first case of Phoenix Wright: Trials And Tribulations. Too bad for him that his sweetheart isn't anywhere near as into him as she pretends. Okay, maybe she is...
• A mod to Baldur's Gate 2: Throne of Bhaal adds a character who seeks out romance with Imoen. In one memorable exchange, they use so many consecutive pet names for each other that even the good-aligned party members find themselves tempted to agree with Sarevok's comment: "Say the word, and I will kill them both. Please."
  • If like me you were ready to hunt across the Internet after reading that, it's kelsey.
• Pokémon has several of these couples, who would constantly talk about "lovey-dovey" they are. For some creepy reason, they were often found in places like graveyards and abandoned ships.
  • Because Girls Are Really Scared of Horror Movies (and by extension, scary places).
• Happily Married couple Maeda Toshiie and his wife Matsu from Sengoku Basara. On one occasion Toshi came to Matsu's rescue on the battlefield, and they shared a tender moment together, leaving their opponent Yukimura at a complete loss of what to do.

Yukimura: S-should I just leave them alone?...

• In Tales of Symphonia, Lloyd Irving and Colette Brunel. The sequel has Emil Castagnier and Marta Lualdi.
  • In Tales of Hearts, Shing and Kohak. Other party members occasionally complain about it. At one point Hisui and Beryl actually raise their Relationship Values through their mutual annoyance at the main couple's sheer couple-ness.
• The Dancing Couple from The Legend of Zelda Ocarina Of Time (and later, Majora's Mask), who seem completely oblivious to anything other than each other.
  • While playing their mini-games in Majora's Mask, you actually get the option to shoot them to increase your time limit. Much fun!
    • And if you win, they say "That's annoying, so let's show off even more!"
• In the Jak and Daxter series, Daxter and Tess act like this. The smooching is pretty much non-existent thanks to the species difference, but the rest of the symptoms are there (baby talk, stupid nicknames, cuddling).
• In Tales of Monkey Island, Guybrush has an almost unlimited number of gooshingly sweet nicknames for Elaine, such as "plunder bunny".
  • Which is also a plush toy rabbit designed explicitly to be used by smugglers. So, uh...maybe not quite as sweet as it sounds.
• If you romance Alistair in Dragon Age, the other party members may accuse you of this. Even Team Mom Wynne.
  • They do the same for a romance with Leliana.
  • If you help two Dalish elves get together, they begin acting like this, while Morrigan disapproves.

"Does anyone else feel the urge to vomit? No? 'Tis just me?"

• Harvest Moon couples have a tendency to be Happily Married, but the award for soppiest couple in the series probably goes to... Jake and Colleen, Maya's parents in Tree of Tranquility and Animal Parade. Jake compares everything to his beloved Colleen and absolutely lives to spoil her, at one point even using the Wizard's crystal ball to read her mind to find out exactly what she wants. They're also constantly holding hands and cuddling. This probably explains why Maya is The Cutie—spending all her life around that kind of sappiness, what else would she be?
• In Super Robot Wars Judgment David will remark he considers Minato and Tsukomi's reactions to each other, albeit while they are kinda heartwarming, they still trigger his gag reflex.

Web Comics

• Bellen.
• In The Order of the Stick, this proved to be Therkla the half-orc's backstory. Stereotypically half-orcs are the product of rape.
  • Arguably, Elan and Haley from the same comic... when they're together.
• Xkcd: "No one must know."
  • Same goes for two normally jerky classmates in Gunnerkrigg Court.
• Tedd and Grace from El Goonish Shive.
• Ezekeil and Ariel in Sinfest, pictured above.
• Slightly Damned has set a new bar for this trope with Buwaro and Kieri.

Web Original

• Cho and Cedric acting like this in A Very Potter Musical piss Harry off to no end since he has a crush on Cho. It actually doesn't end well though since Cedric gets murdered.

Western Animation

• A featured couple in Futurama who ran the candy company Romanticorp inspired the page quote from Leela, with a little assistance from The Professor and his cattle prod.
  • And from I Dated a Robot:

Lucy Liu-bot: You're cute!
Fry: No, you are!
Lucy Liu-bot: No, you!
Fry: No, you!
Professor Farnsworth: Oh dear! She's stuck in an infinite loop, and he's an idiot! Well, that's love for you.

• • Also the Alternate Universe versions of Fry and Leela.
    • Although they're not really sickeningly sweet.
• Once Scott and Jean finally get together, Kurt and Kitty gleefully mock them as being this by going full out daytime-TV.
• Geoff and Bridgette in Total Drama Action, becoming so annoying that they're the first ones voted off.
  • In the special:

Josh: Cutie patootie?
Blaineley: Schmoopie poo?
Both: Ew!

• • Katie and Sadie have this as part of their extreme Romantic Two-Girl Friendship.
• Jérémie and Aelita from Code Lyoko can sometimes slip into this. They do have fights or misunderstandings a few times, but it is always resolved by the end of the episode.
• Subverted in Batman: The Animated Series. Joker and Harley do act this way sometimes, but this just makes their relationship even creepier.
• Subverted on Jimmy Two-Shoes. Lucius tries acting this way whenever he's around Jez. However, she seems largely uninterested in returning his affection.
• A both odd and hypocritical version of this appared on Kick Buttowski with Ronaldo witnessing a kissing "couple".

Ronaldo: (while talking on the phone) "Oh, just a second, honey..." (yells at kissing couple beside him) "YOU KNOW THERE IS SUCH A THING AS TOO MUCH AFFECTION!" (goes back to his phonecall) "See you soonsies!"

• • The couple in question were of course... Kick and Ronaldo's girlfriend (whom he was talking with on the phone), Kendall.
• Clover and Blaine have this type of relationship in the final season of Totally Spies!.
• A variation of this occurs in Beast Wars, where this is only on one side of the relationship, that of Knight in Shining Armor Idiot Hero Silverbolt, while the object of his affections, the Dark Action Girl Femme Fatale Kuudere Blackarachnia, despite returning his affections, is as annoyed by it the same as everyone else.
• Although not a complete example of this trope, there is one episode of My Life as a Teenage Robot in which Brad is about to be married to an alien who refers to him as "Bradley-Boo". Squick.
• Professor Utonium and Miss Keane become this in an episode of The Powerpuff Girls. They break up when it turns out that he doesn't like her cat.
• Big Macintosh and Cheerilee act like this in the My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic episode "Hearts and Hooves Day", thanks to a love potion provided by the Cutie Mark Crusaders. They spend nearly half the episode staring into each other's eyes and calling each other cutesy pet names.
  • The "sickening" part is quite literal, they visibly sicken the Crusaders repeatedly with their cutesy pet names.

Big Macintosh: SHMOOPY DOO!

Real Life

• You might know at least one couple like this.
  • There's always at least one Showmance like this in a theatre production. To everyone involved, it's a distraction.
  • What's really fun is when you're friends with a couple on Facebook, and you're constantly seeing their wall-to-wall posts consisting of "I luv u huny bunz! ^_^" "I luv u2 sweetie :-3"
• Subverted in the Behind The Music episode about TLC. When Lisa "Left Eye" Lopez was dating football player Andre Rison, her bandmates would get annoyed by their sappiness. T-Boz mentioned how they'd always call each other baby: "Hey Baby... Baby... Baby..." and it cut right into Rozanda "Chilli" Thomas saying the exact same thing. Two years later... Left Eye burned his house down when she thought he was cheating.
• This installment of Gothic Charm School provides some useful tips for dealing with people like this.