The “Friendzone” happens to everyone – even to fictional characters. Movies and television shows depict some of the biggest cases of friendzoning to guys and girls. Sometimes there are happy endings—and sometimes there aren’t. Here are 8 of the top fictional friendzonings of the shows and movies we love.
Katniss and Gale / Katniss and Peeta, The Hunger Games: Team Peeta or Team Gale? This one is a little confusing; which guy is the crush and which is just the friend? Sometimes even Katniss doesn’t know. There’s Gale, the childhood guy friend she’s known forever, and there’s Peeta the fellow tribute who’s loved her forever. When her and Peeta have to fake love to get through the Games, things get complicated. Gale’s jealous that Katniss is always all over Peeta for the Capital’s cameras, and Peeta’s jealous that Katniss doesn’t have fake emotion when she’s around Gale.
What Happened: SPOILER ALERT: Though her emotions fluctuate throughout the trilogy, Katniss eventually chooses Peeta, leaving Gale permanently in the friendzone. To be fair though, though, Gale did kind of accidently indirectly kill her little sister so…
Peter Pan and Tinkerbell, Peter Pan: This one may have gone over our heads at the time, but Tinkerbell was pretty into Peter Pan. It’s clear she and Peter are close, but she has so many girls to compete with. Between Wendy, Tiger Lily, and all the Mermaids in Neverland, Tink is stuck labeled as just his pixie friend. Actions speak louder than words though, and her trying to have Wendy killed off by the Lost Boys definitely reads as “jealous.”
What Happened: Tink is forgiven for trying to kill Wendy when she saves Peter from Captain Hook’s murder attempt. In a way, Tinkerbell gets what she wants when Wendy decides to return to London rather than stay in Neverland, but does Tink eventually get with Peter? At least now she has him to herself.
Lizzie and Gordo, Lizzie McGuire: Lizzie, Miranda, and Gordo were the ultimate trio, but Lizzie was apparently too wrapped up in hottie Ethan Kraft and fending off mean-girl Kate to recognize Gordo’s obvious affection for her. Yet he was always there, offering advice, cracking jokes, and dishing out sarcasm.
What Happened: In The Lizzie McGuire Movie, Gordo prevents Lizzie from embarrassing herself in front of the entirety of Rome, finally opening Lizzie’s eyes to the fact that he likes her. The two share a shy kiss on the roof, and leave the rest up to the audience to decide.
Zoey and Chase, Zoey 101: She was the cute blonde, and he was her dorky best friend. From day one, he had a crush on her, and it only continues to grow as they spent their school days at their ridiculously ideal boarding school (for real, who didn’t want to go to PCA?).
What Happened: In what was probably the strangest turn of events, Zoey ships off to that London boarding school at Chase’s sarcastic urging. Then both decide they want to work things out and without telling each other, flew to the other’s school to explain how they feel. Why they didn’t just call or email each other instead of uprooting their entire lives is irrelevant. Eventually both of them attend PCA’s prom together, kiss, and decide to spend their summer in Hawaii as a couple.
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Arnold and Helga, Hey Arnold: Helga kind of friendzoned herself here, by being so mean to Arnold in the first place. She was our favorite obsessive though, disguising the fact that she had a shrine to Arnold in her closet with insults and the constant use of the nickname “Football Head.” Hints were dropped like crazy, but either Arnold was completely oblivious to Helga’s crush or he just didn’t want to believe it.
What Happened: In the Hey Arnold Movie, Helga professes her love for Arnold and smothers him in kisses. Arnold kind of freaks out at this, and later gives Helga the chance to revoke the statement, saying she probably caught up in the heat of the moment. Again, either he just really doesn’t believe she likes him, or he really, really doesn’t want her to.
Pam and Jim, The Office: Everybody wanted them to just be together already. Pam may have been engaged to Roy, but Jim always liked her, even through the times he had a girlfriend of his own. Together, Pam and Jim were coworkers AND best friends, pranking Dwight, surviving Michael, and turning to look directly at the camera whenever anyone in the office said something stupid.
What Happened: A happy ending! TV’s cutest coworkers eventually get married and have not one but two kids together, before quitting Dunder Mifflin and moving to Austin as a family.
Summer and Tom, 500 Days of Summer: This one was painful. Friendzoned with benefits, Tom fell in love with quirky Summer Finn, even when she specifically told him she wasn’t looking for a boyfriend. The adorably offbeat duo went on adorably offbeat dates and did adorable couple-y things, so one really couldn’t blame him for falling so hard.
What Happened: They’re just chilling eating pancakes one day, and Summer says she doesn’t want to be his hookup anymore, just be friends and leave it at that. We want to hate Summer for crushing gorgeous Joseph Gordon-Lovett’s heart, but to fair, she did let him know she never wanted a relationship in the first place.
Anyway, after sinking into a deep depression, Tom hits it off with a girl he meets at a job interview named Autumn (see what they did there?), kicking off what we can only assume will be X-Number of Days of Autumn.
Lily Potter and Snape, Harry Potter Series: This may be one of the biggest friendzones of pop culture. Honestly, the Lily-Snap friendzoning shaped the series that morphed into a $15 billion franchise. Growing up, Lily and Snape were best friends; they confided in each other about their magical abilities before they even attended Hogwarts, and Snape loved her all along.
What Happened: Everything completely backfired is what happened. Lily fell for James Potter, the school jock who tormented Snape, and when Snape couldn’t convince her to break it off, he ran off and joined Voldemort’s Death Eaters. When Voldemort killed the Potter’s but failed to kill Harry, Snape spent the rest of his life dedicated to protecting Lily’s orphaned son and bringing down the Dark Lord. This plot line is literally worth 15 billion dollars.
All this because Snape could not escape the friend zone.
Pop culture is full of famous friendzones; sometime’s they’re sweet, sometimes they’re sad, but they’re always fun to watch!