Writing Enemies To Lovers: The Basic Ingredients

Do you have any tips for writing enemies to lovers?

Hi, love!  Thanks for your question and your patience<3  I’m currently writing somethingsimilar to this, so I hope my experience can help you here!

Enemies-to-lovers is a popular trope, but it’s often treatedcarelessly by writers – especially TV/movie writers who rush through thetransition to fit a single movie or episode arc.  There’s nothing worseyou can do in this situation than to rush your arc.  Falling in love isalready a time-consuming plotline – but transitioning from enemies, who arealready shutting each other out, to lovers?  The quicker it happens, theless believable it becomes.

I have a lot of notes on how to write enemies to lovers, sobear with me as I list them out.

Writing Enemies to Lovers: The Basic Ingredients

1. Give them some similar traits.

No matter what, two people can’t fall in love if they don’trelate on some level.  The first step to creating possible love interestsis to find where they’ll connect.  Are they a hero and a villain? Evil and good?  Night and day?  I bet they both love animals. Maybe they’re both way into politics.  Maybe they share a commonenemy.  Maybe they’re both neat freaks or a bit sassy or super gay or lovethe same music.  It can be a few important things or a bunch of superficialthings – just make sure they have something that can tie themtogether.

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2. Put them on the same side of something.

When two people are mortal foes, it can be hard for them tosee each other in any other light.  Bringing in a common enemy (ananti-hero, a natural disaster, a person in power), or a common interest (amutual friend, a school play, a moral cause), can land foes on a teamtogether.  This forces them to become aware of each other’s strengths, andto consider (and worry about) each other’s weaknesses.  This is perfectfodder for an eyebrows-raised, “Hey, they don’t suck at this particularthing,” moment.

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3. Get them alone.

With other people watching (especiallyfriends/coworkers/allies), little groundwork can be made for your twohate-lovers.  If you get your characters alone together, you’re given abounty of opportunities to bond them, including but not limited to: actualconversations, accidental (or faux-accidental) physical contact, the sneakymoment of checking each other out, etc. etc. etc.  People are differentwhen you get them away from their friends – less extreme, less rowdy, lessunreachable.  If you have to trap your characters in an elevator theold-fashioned way, damn it, you’re the only one who can do it.

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4. Let them fight their feelings.

If these two are truly enemies, there isn’t going to be amoment of, “Oh, I like them.  Huh.  Neato.”  Oh, no. There will be internal backlash – they will beat their emotions back with abroom, and deny them to anyone who asks.  There will be extra hatefulglares, more middle fingers, and basically anything they can do to remindthemselves that they don’t like this person.  If you show thisinternal conflict, it both (a) makes the feelings seem real, organic, and (b)creates a more realistic transition from hate to love.

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5. Love can sound like hate.

There’s a reason people say indifference is the trueopposite of love.  When your two enemies start to feel things foreach other, this will probably spark a lot of ranting, arguing, anddoor-slamming.  It creates a fixation – you sit there and you stew andyou tell your friends, “Remember when they did thatstupid thing?  Yeah.  Screw them.”  Your friends roll theireyes.  When will you stop talking about this person?  Just kiss themalready.

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6. Sexual tension is a powerful tool.

If your characters experience sexual attraction, this is agreat way to accelerate their relationship against their will.  It’s theage-old, “My mind says no but my body says yes,” dilemma.  Yourcharacters can’t stand each other, or the image they have of each other, butthey’re attracted like magnets and can’t shake it.  This can make for somepretty hot – or pretty hilarious – scenes.

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7. Give them a moment of horrified realization.

Eventually, the feelings will grow strong enough that one orboth of them will have to sit there, probably on the bathroom floor a littlebit drunk with one sock on, and realize: “I love that f*cker.”  It’llbe a scary moment for them.  It’s not that they haven’t known it – theyjust have yet to accept that it’s something to deal with, until now.  Thiscan be prompted by a dangerous situation, a shared activity, or a failed attemptat another romance – so when they really sit and think about it, theyknow.  Then it becomes a question of either “how do I get rid of this?”or “how do I pursue this?”.

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8. Try their hand at flirting.

Whether one or both characters have come to accept theirfeelings, someone’s gotta start flirting.  A glancing touch across thearm; a small comment that could kind of be construed as amicable; a lingeringglance; that first peek at their enemy’s smile.  Something cute and quickand immediately followed by an existential crisis will do in a pinch. Without this water-testing, readers won’t have any image of what thisrelationship will look like – and if it can succeed.

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9. Craft the perfect kiss/hug/confession.

When the time is right, create an undeniable display ofattraction to transition into a new phase of their relationship:the “welp-we-both-like-each-other” phase, which comes right beforethe “we-decided-to-(stay-platonic/start-romancin’)” phase.  The BigKiss/Confession is the most iconic climactic love scene, in which the twocharacters take a chance and become vulnerable with each other – and kiss, orsay, “I love you,” or do anything that can’t be construed in any otherway.  Want to extend the drama?  Interrupt them, or have it beone-sided, or let it turn into a fight until they decide, “Forget it, thiswas stupid.”  Readers will swoon.

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10. Finish up with an awkward adjustment period.

If and when your characters do enter a relationship, makesure it’s a little tentative at the beginning, to keep it realistic.  Yourcharacters have made a huge shift in their dynamic – there will be somelingering arguments and love-hate, and maybe a bit of discomfort going publicwith their romance.  Then come the usual growing pains of a new relationshipgetting serious – figuring out how to navigate each other’s flaws, learning tobe open with their feelings, dealing with unresolved fights from before theirrelationship.  It won’t be perfect right away.  That’s the beauty of it.

Do You Have Any Tips For Writing Enemies To Lovers?

I hope this helps you, love!  I adore love-haterelationships, and I hope you enjoy crafting your own enemies-to-lovers as muchas we’ll all love reading them :)  Good luck!

– Mod Joanna ♥️

Ifyou need advice on general writing or fanfiction, you should maybe ask us!

More Posts from Shv2 and Others

5 months ago

Took commissions, 100% recommend. My profile pic is drawn by him, it came out exactly as I asked! Cool as fuck.

Happy New Year friends, I’m Vert and I draw stuff!

Happy New Year Friends, I’m Vert And I Draw Stuff!

I’ve never posted here before, but here we go.

▸ he/him

▸ I will most probably post or repost 18+ content, be careful!

▸ Commissions open

▸ OC and fandom stuff

▸ I also like writing, photographing and making music

▸ Disco Elysium, Resident Evil, Red Dead Redemption 2, Devil May Cry, Postal series, Outlast


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1 year ago

one thing i’m slowly picking up on is that a lot of the people who are saying ‘ukraine should negotiate with putin’ don’t actually realise that this war did not begin in february 2022. this war has been going on for over 8 years, and the february invasion was the final nail in the coffin that made ukraine go ‘enough. we cannot appease putin anymore, we cannot negotiate, we simply have to fight back’. 

yanukovych was elected as president in 2012 on a ‘tighter ties with the EU’ platform. he proceeded to betray that platform, cosying up with putin and attempting to take ukraine in a direction which involved closer economic ties to russia. that decision triggered the euromaidan protests of 2013-14, the deaths of hundreds of ukrainian civilians, and eventually yanukovych fled to russia where he was granted asylum by putin himself. the berkut (special military forces) were dissolved, and with yanukovych gone ukraine signed the trade agreement with the EU. these events are known as the ‘revolution of dignity’.

putin’s response to this (ukraine’s pointed desire to be aligned with western europe, not russia) was to invade and annexe crimea. russian military presence was escalated on the peninsula, and nuclear threats were made (sound familiar?) to prevent ukraine and/or the west from doing anything to return crimea to ukrainian control. despite ukraine risking so much to become more aligned with the west, the west did nothing about this for fear of nuclear attacks. ukraine was told to just accept it, that this annexation was a necessary sacrifice for wider peace.

in 2015, putin began to send militant forces into eastern ukraine to actively back russian-separatist voices in the donbass. on a fundamental level, ukraine lost control of donetsk and luhansk due to putin shoving mercenaries into the region. similar to how putin actively placed russians into crimea to prove it was majority russia, he began to do the same in donetsk and luhansk. unlike crimea, however, there was no ‘official annexation’ declaration made… at least, not until february 2022, the day before the full scale invasion.

add in multiple cyber-attacks, false propaganda being promoted, and a year of military build up on the russo-ukraine border throughout 2021 and into 2022, and there is absolutely no argument that can be viably made against the fact that this war has been going on for almost a decade. and fundamentally, i don’t think a lot of people actually realise that. they realise putin is a maniac who believes ukraine is not a valid country, but they don’t realise that this invasion in february 2022 was not just a random decision putin made. it was the next logical step (in his mind) considering every step he’s made in the last decade has been met with appeasement, appeasement, appeasement. he has faced next to no consequences for what he’s done to ukraine. and so of course that has then made him go ‘excellent, time for another round then’.

the end to this war is full russian withdrawal. that is the only end to this war, the only end we should accept, and the only end which will actually be an end. putin’s threat of using nuclear war was precisely why the world did nothing as he annexed crimea. and it set a precedent that he could use that threat again and face no consequences. of course ukraine is fighting back. of course the world is backing them. we have to. we must. this war did not begin in 2022, it began many years before that. to quote zelenskyy, “everything started with crimea, and everything will end with crimea.”

ukrainian liberation (and that absolutely includes crimea) is coming. the trajectory of this war is only going in one direction, and that’s in ukraine’s favour. appeasing putin is what will make this war drag out for another decade or so, because we’ve tried appeasement for close to a decade already. and it didn’t work. it led to putin believing he had the right to begin a full scale invasion.

3 years ago
Wonder Over Yonder Art In 2021? Couldn’t Be Me
Wonder Over Yonder Art In 2021? Couldn’t Be Me
Wonder Over Yonder Art In 2021? Couldn’t Be Me
Wonder Over Yonder Art In 2021? Couldn’t Be Me

Wonder over yonder art in 2021? Couldn’t be me

I’ve Been re-watching wonder over yonder and I simply had to draw him

1 year ago

SUP

So today is a important day it’s my ✨birthday✨ As is tradition I make a art piece to celebrate But today is a lot more special

You see I have learnt so much in this year through the beginning of school and who I am

To the people who hurt me and betrayed me or to the people who came into my life and gave me support

Such as my cartoon characters without these characters from these shows that taught me

Like wander who taught me to help anyone no matter who are where they come from or to moon girl who taught me I am intelligent in my own ways

To skid and pump who taught me I’m not alone in my weirdness

But to all of my friends who made me keep going no matter what I was going through in my life

SUP

Either them real or being cartoons these people and characters taught me so much and I will never stop being me

Thank you all for the love and support of my art …

Everyone keep going

And repost this to send the message that none of us are alone

Even if life gives us pain I believe it is followed by love and forgiveness

Don’t give up

Do what I did learn something new, make a new friend, join a club do anything all of us together have purpose and a destiny in our lives so go out there AND CHANGE THIS WORLD


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3 weeks ago

A Rant About Wander

We all know how obsessed/crazy Wander can get if he's not able to help people. It's how he acts in "The Sick Day," but also "The Helper," where we see a glimpse of Wander's heroic, black-and-white personality; the person he is without his core self:

A Rant About Wander
A Rant About Wander

For the first time, we see Wander look at Hater as a bad guy he has to "stop" and he can't believe that, behind all his evil deeds, he's a normal guy just trying to pick up his lunch. A similiar moment happens in "The Wanders," where Wander sees Hater as a heartless evil-doer and says: "I am a good guy, and he is a bad guy, and I stop him!" he's like Brad Starlight It's clear tunnel vision

A Rant About Wander
A Rant About Wander

When Sylvia tells Wander how it's good that people don't need his help all the time, he's curious as to why. Wander's so used to being the nice guy that he wonders why it's a bad thing that he's one to such an obsessive degree.

A Rant About Wander
A Rant About Wander

It's not just that he enjoys helping others or that he empathizes deeply with everyone due to his (unexplored) past; Wander also wants to feel worthy/good about himself. Look at this line from "The Big Job":

A Rant About Wander

Wander feels WORTHLESS when he messes up, he feels worthless when he's not doing anything for other people. His desire to help stems not only from past pain but also feelings of not being good enough and he buries them deep deep DEEP down

As humble as Wander is, he enjoys being seen as a legendary hero because it makes him feel important. See how excited he gets here?

A Rant About Wander

Hero Wander is even a part of him, as we see in "The Wanders"; there's no way he doesn't have savior complex/hero syndrome:

A Rant About Wander
A Rant About Wander

Wander never denies being 'the legend.' On the contrary, as soon as Hank starts describing "The Hero," he figures out he's talking about him and says "Oh, really?" like he's reveling in that fact:

A Rant About Wander

He just goes with the kids' portrayals of him even though they aren't accurate. And he knows. He KNOWS that the Yonder galaxy thinks of both himself and Sylvia as heroes:

A Rant About Wander

"The Family Reunion" shows exactly how well-known Syl and Wan are:

A Rant About Wander

There's also this deleted scene from "The Hole... Lotta Nuthin'" where Wander pretty much reveals that he KNOWS he's very well-known and is being just a tiiiiiiny bit arrogant about it:

A Rant About Wander

When Wander doesn't feel worthless, he acknowledges/ doesn't deny/enjoys being seen as a hero, but when he's down in the dumps, he'll straight up say he's not one, which is what he said in "The Big Job"

Then there's this moment in "The Good Deed" where he's being a show-off:

A Rant About Wander

Wander not only has flaws, but he's actually no stranger to negative emotions either.

In "The Good Deed," he gives in to nihilism:

A Rant About Wander
A Rant About Wander

Wander was ready to drown himself in mud because he thought doing good was pointless in the end, that things will turn bad anyway no matter what he does. I never saw anyone talk about what this scene implies, but it's both really dark and really heartbreaking. WoY actually tackled it with care and a good moral about life, though

He's heartbroken when he thinks his good intentions didn't amount to anything ("The Gift 2: The Giftening"):

A Rant About Wander

He feels hopeless after repeated failure and needs Sylvia to lift his spirits ("The Liar"):

A Rant About Wander
A Rant About Wander

In "The Show Stopper," he's so focused on getting Dominator to notice Hater's concert that he completely forgets to rescue the bunny folk (he probably came back for them later, but the thing about Wander is that when he's hyperfocused on a specific thing or goal, he's HYPERFOCUSED).

In "The Battle Royale," he gets so caught up in getting Hater and Dominator together that he accidentally creates an entire warzone, gets McGuffin fried, and becomes (temporarily) discouraged after he thinks he failed to set the two up (and soften Hater's heart):

A Rant About Wander
A Rant About Wander

And yet, no matter what happens, he always bounces back ("The Flower" shows this best), either with Sylvia's help, or on his own. Season three would have challenged him, though:

A Rant About Wander

In "The Void," Wander is selfish and controlling and only thinks about what he wants to do, and what's interesting is how that was metaphorically shown by having him control Sylvia like she's a puppet:

A Rant About Wander

This episode suggests that a part of Wander, at least subconsciously, sometimes wants control over Sylvia (best seen in "The Tourist," where he constantly neglects her need for rest so he could compete with Trudi). This ties in with another thing I want to talk about, and that's how there's a clue in "The Rider" that Wander didn't have a deep one-on-one friendship with anyone before he befriended Sylvia (even if he had other travel partners). He literally had to consult Frederick about how to handle the falling out between them:

A Rant About Wander

Wander always had acquaintances, strangers he helped, and villains he reformed around him; he probably dated many people, too. But he never bonded with someone who genuinely liked being around him, who cared about his safety and well-being and who'd always have his back. He and Syl are found family siblings to me He's so used to either being by himself and doing whatever he wants or only making casual connections; it's understandable why he'd struggle with thinking about others' feelings at times. Yeah, Wander takes care of people in a practical sense, but intimate relationships where he sometimes has to sacrifice his autonomy are still new to him.

Tl;dr Wander looks silly and shallow but he's such a flawed, deep character when you peel back the layers.


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11 months ago

You should be furious that people trying to escape genocide in Gaza, Sudan, Congo all need raise an absurd amount of money just to survive

You should be furious at how these people went through atrocity after atrocity and still need raise tens of thousands of dollars to get away

You should be furious at this insidious thing that completely encapsulates how capitalism feeds off of blood


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5 years ago
I See Someone Made Wander A Sad Backstory

I see someone made Wander a sad backstory

I made one for Hater myself

1 year ago

The pilot animatic for Wander Over Yonder has been found and preserved by user Derps on YouTube! Huzzah!

1 year ago
2 months ago

that's it, I can't take this anymore. I'm so fucking done. I feel like a non-Christian person in fucking December. Listen, people: the Ides of March is a FINE holiday, it's fun and nerdy, I like it - but I've seen like 6 memes for it in the last 3 days and not a Single one for its sibling nerd holiday, MARCH 14, aka 3/14, aka

PI DAY

That's It, I Can't Take This Anymore. I'm So Fucking Done. I Feel Like A Non-Christian Person In Fucking

3/14, optimized at 1:59 and 26 seconds, AM or PM (3.141592653589793238462643383279502884197169399... that's as far as I ever memorized).

Celebrations around the world - as is ONLY appropriate for the one and only celebration of the constant ratio of the circumference of a circle to its diameter!

And the radius to its area, and the radius of a sphere to its volume and surface area, AND one of the key five numbers in Euler's Identity, aka e^(iπ) + 1 = 0, aka the sexiest, simplest mathematical equation in the world.

There's going to be an HOUR-LONG LUNAR ECLIPSE this year, visible throughout East Asia, Australia, North and South America, and most of Africa and Europe!

It's even Albert Einstein's birthday!

Is Pi Day underrepresented because math is continuously viewed as the subject it's culturally acceptable to hate, where even "boring" history and "pretentious" literature can be lauded? Does every holiday need a centuries-famous play in order to get attention these days? DO PEOPLE NOT WANT AN EXCUSE TO EAT SAVORY PIES FOR DINNER (PIZZA, SHEPHERD'S PIE, ETC) AND SWEET PIES OF FRUIT AND/OR CHOCOLATE FOR DESSERT??

So help me god I'm going to start making a new Pi Day meme every time I see an Ides of March meme. I'm going to blaze them. PRETENDING TO KILL A DICTATOR IS FUN, BUT IT IS A TREAT BEST PAIRED WITH THE ELEVATION OF SCIENCE!


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