Joey, Pacey and Dawson – Dawson’s Creek
Only a cold heart would fail to break for giant gooseberry Dawson Leery (James Van Der Beek) as he watched his best friends, Joey (Katie Holmes) and Pacey (Joshua Jackson), sail off into the sunset together after years of indecision on Joey’s part. Pacey and Joey were obviously destined to spawn beautiful, chestnut-haired offspring from episode one. The moment these two velvety fawns laid their enormous brown eyes on each other, Dawson was out of the picture, but it took them all absolutely ages to realise it. Cue long summers of heart-tugging break-ups, huge, sad foal-eyes across crowded proms and Joey repeating that nervous hair-tuck until the tresses around her left ear went permanently bent. Poor Dawson could only look on like a terminally disparaged Ken doll as the love of his life cantered back up that beautifully appointed pier and into the waiting hooves of a waaaaaay hotter stallion. If you preferred Dawson to Pacey, you were scientifically wrong.
Angela, Jordan and Brian – My So-Called Life
Who would you choose to bang: a big-eyed boybander in a thong necklace or a kindly, asexual lion? My So-Called Life’s Angela Chase (Claire Danes) gave me weekly conniptions throughout the 90s with her idiotic refusal to see that neighbour Brian (the aforementioned lion played by Devon Gummersall) was the right boy for her. Instead, she homed in on vacant high-school heartthrob Jordan (Jared Leto) and his hypnotic python eyes. She thought she could save him from not being able to read good – but who could save her from her maddening over-thinking, and eventually turning into a jazz-mad FBI agent with a complicated personal life? Brian could’ve. But he didn’t get the chance because he was a cowardly lion as well as an asexual one and couldn’t fess up to his feelings at the crucial moment. Hence Carrie from Homeland was born.
Ross, Rachel and Joey – Friends
It always made sense that the two densest characters in Friends would eventually get it together. So when Rachel Green (Jennifer Aniston), who spent whole series oblivious to Ross’s tongue trailing on the floor whenever she was around, began having sex dreams about her good pal Joey Tribbiani (Matt LeBlanc) – who hadn’t heard of Stalin – the universe leaned back on its chair and agreed that this would go well. All except Ross (David Schwimmer) who, despite now dating Joey’s ex Charlie (improbably, a hot palaeontologist), couldn’t reach acceptance when it came to the new relationship. Self-medicating with too many margaritas, burning his hands on fajitas and squawking about how FINE he was failed to convince anyone. The universe (and the writers) eventually agreed that, however implausible, Ross really was Rachel’s lobster and the two should end the show re-coupled while Joey went off to present Top Gear.
Jeremy, Mark and Dobby – Peep Show
Possibly the most fun thing about the toxic friendship between Mark Corrigan (David Mitchell) and Jeremy Usbourne (Robert Webb) was the latter’s spiteful insistence on falling for the former’s romantic partners, just to enrage him. Not once but twice Jez decided he was hopelessly in love with Mark’s girl: first Sophie (Olivia Colman) and then Dobby (Isy Suttie). The two men ended up angrily competing to hold in their wee at a picnic before repeatedly electrocuting one another on a rural fence. Meanwhile, Dobs ditched the pair of them for a new life in New York – and who can blame her? Mark and Jez were meant to be together for eternity anyway and no woman was going to spoil that.
The Doctor, Rose and Mickey – Doctor Who
Hardly a series goes by without there being some kind of sexy tension between the time-traversing eccentric and his younger, lissom female companion (which may or may not change with the arrival of Jodie Whittaker’s Time Lord). But back in the day (or forward: time has no meaning here) Rose Tyler (Billie Piper) had it bad for her Doctor (played by Christopher Eccleston, then David Tennant). It was Tennant’s incarnation that got the full force of Rose’s pout as, hanging off a ledge on some alien planet, she only occasionally remembered Mickey, the boyfriend back on Earth. His fate it was to look sadly at the space where the Tardis had been, wondering if he’d see her again. In the end, Rose swallowed time, went gold and moved to a parallel universe with a different version of her Doctor. The end.
Dawn, Tim and Lee – The Office
Before he had his empathy removed, Ricky Gervais co-wrote the tenderest love story between Dawn (Lucy Davies) and Tim (Martin Freeman) in The Office. Saddled with an archetypal “lad” who crushed her artistic soul, Dawn’s romantic muse was finally awoken by unassuming colleague Tim when he gave her some oil paints as a leaving present. Their eventual kiss to Yazoo’s Only You still makes you well up, as Dawn says she’s no longer engaged to Lee and goes for the full face-holder snog while a stunned Tim stands in the middle of the office Christmas party like a surprised mannequin. It was gratifying to see Tim, always the underdog, get the moment of romantic realisation he’d longed for – like never happens in real life.
Buffy, Spike and Angel – Buffy the Vampire Slayer
“I’m getting the brush-off for Captain Peroxide,” snarked altruistic blood-sucker Angel (David Boreanaz) to his vampire-slaying ex (Sarah Michelle Gellar) because she’d started seeing the Billy Idol lookalike. The perky evil-eradicator continued to hold a flame for Angel, despite plainly having a heap more deviant fun with the cockney blond who had a habit of crossing the room groin-first whenever she was in it and calling her “love”. Phwoargh. The great thing about dating undead men is the potential for rekindled romance long, long into the future. Angel and Buffy are almost certainly married now and having rows in Ikea for eternity.
Carrie, Big and Aidan – Sex and the City
The final episode of Sex and the City saw Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) finally get together with Mr Big (Chris Noth) after a passionate pinball game that saw her ricocheting back to Big more than once, despite his toxicity and tendency to page his limo driver and flee every time intimacy or commitment loomed on the horizon. The notion of a love interest nicknamed for his alpha-ness has dated quickly but there’s no denying the power he had over the neurotic columnist, even when she was trying to forge a future with someone new. Poor furniture-maker Aidan (John Corbett) was good with wood but less so with the fluctuating affections of a girlfriend still in love with her impossible ex. The death knell came for their relationship when Aidan physically tried to rip down a wall between them, symbolism definitely intended, and Carrie had a panic attack trying on a wedding dress. It was always going to be the cigar-smoking, vineyard-owning, supremely wealthy commitment-phobe for Carrie. Go figure.
Martin, Ann and Paul – Ever Decreasing Circles
Time to revisit this exemplary sitcom if you are unfamiliar. In it, Richard Briers plays Martin, a fastidious, beta-man with an exquisite wife named Ann (Penelope Wilton). Into their neatly arranged paradise comes Paul (Peter Egan), a louche salon-owner with one eyebrow permanently arched in sexual invitation. He toyed with his married neighbours for years, never quite understanding that Ann and Martin, for all her frustration, had a love that couldn’t be chipped by the semi-serious advances of an over-sexed hairdresser. Paul provided the grit that made Ann and Martin’s flawed oyster so beautiful. A more delicately balanced TV threesome you couldn’t wish to find.
Rod, Jane and Freddy – Rainbow
Sometimes, real life is more fascinating than fiction and so it was with Rod Burton, Freddy Marks and Jane Tucker who performed as the human musical trio in the children’s 70s-90s ITV puppet show, Rainbow. Jane and Rod had married and divorced by the time young Freddy arrived to join the band. But there’s always a fascination with what goes on behind the sunny smiles and exaggerated dance moves of children’s TV and – despite the denial of scandal on all sides – Rod’s eyes remind me of a sad bear who’s lost its owner. After 30 years together, Jane and Freddy finally got married two years ago and everyone still appears to be friends.
