The 'Other' Love Story

From Fanlore
Jump to navigation Jump to search
Fandom
Name: The 'Other' Love Story
Abbreviation(s):
Creator: Roopa Rao
Date(s): 27 August 2016
Medium: Live Action Web Series, Live Action TV
Country of Origin: India
External Links: Offical JLT's YouTube Episode Playlist
at Wikipedia
at IMDb
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

The 'Other' Love Story is a 2016 Indian romance drama about two women, Aadya and Aachal, falling in love in the 1990s/early 2000s. The series' creation was crowd-funded and it was said to be India's first web series with a same-sex love story [1].

Canon

Spoiler Warning: This article or section may contain spoilers. If this bothers you, proceed with caution.

The 12-part web series starts with Aachal on board a train, unsuccessfully trying to get hold of Aadya, before going back to the very start of of their friendship and the slow-burn romance that developed between them.

Following their developing relationship, the story eventually leads back to the series of events that preceded the opening scenes, where Aachal's family learn of their relationship and try to end the romance by sending Aachal to live with family in America. However, the story has a happy ending when Aadya is revealed to be on the same train, and the pair are reunited and the show ends with them leaving together.

The series' dialogue is in English, Hindi and Kannada.

Fandom

As of April 2024, there seems to be a microfandom for the series, with a small number of fanworks, video edits and discussions around the show on various platforms. There are 4 fanworks on Archive of Our Own, 1 on Fanfiction.net, and 1 on Wattpad. There are a small number of edits on TikTok, and Gif sets and discussions seem popular on Tumblr.

Roopa Rao’s win as Best Director at the 2016 NYC Web Fest, and the success of the series overall, shows that queer love stories like these, especially from marginalized communities, can succeed — and can especially succeed when given happy endings. There was no need to create drama through death, overly used as a cheap trope in romantic stories (star-crossed lovers! how tragic!). Aadya and Aachal’s story had enough drama, compassion, love, humour, and charm for us to relate to and find enjoyment.

'Indian Web Series “The Other Love Story” Gives Queer Women A Happy Ending', Creatrix Tiara, Autostraddle, 14 December 2016, Archived version

Pairings

Aachal/Aadya are the focus of most fanworks and discussions in the fandom spaces for The 'Other' Love Story, though discussions around familial relationships do sometimes take place as well.

Common Fanon, Headcanons or Tropes

Example Fanworks

Fanfic

Fan vids

Fan art

Further Information and Reading

Resources and Archives

References