Deconstructing Dark Romance:

A Critical Analysis of the Portrayal of Gender, Power, and Choice

Abstract

In the 2010s, dark romance has become an increasingly popular and distinctive subgenre of contemporary romance. Unlike regular romance, dark romance promises a focus on more complex, ambiguous, and oftentimes taboo tropes, including stalking, violence, and emotional manipulation. This fact becomes concerning when one considers the genre’s almost limitless accessibility due to the internet and its highly supportive online community. Given the persuasive effect of mainstream media, the lack of critical engagement and discussion risks the popularization and internalization of values that do not promote equality. Therefore, this research intends to evaluate the predominant mode of representing gender and the power dynamics between characters in the dark romance genre. To answer the research questions, this study conducts a discourse analysis of five prominent dark romance novels chosen by purposive sampling. The texts were identified through Goodreads, as it provides a measurable indicator for a text’s cultural reach. The selection criteria prioritized high readership and positive reception to ensure the chosen novels represented the genre’s mainstream appeal, including publication within the last ten years and the exclusion of novels with fantastical elements. A hybrid approach was employed to develop a thematic coding system organized into two main categories corresponding to the research questions: Gender Representation and Power Dynamics. The theoretical framework guiding this process is a postfeminist sensibility established by Rosalind Gill. The findings of this study demonstrate that these novels operate on a concerning framework that is designed to romanticize and eventually justify power imbalances. The narrative begins with the construction of an essentialist view of gender, in which femininity and masculinity are first and foremost established through an overdramatized image of the body to establish the initial power difference. Then, on this foundation, the novels build their central fantasy of eroticizing male control, reframing domination, possessiveness, and narratively justified violence as signs of passion. Finally, in dark romance, the heroine “voluntarily” accepts her subordination through her own act of “agency”. Notably, dark romance is not just a simple rejection of feminist ideals, but rather the use of its language to make a patriarchal fantasy palatable. These novels also provide a revealing look into the contradictory ways of understanding contemporary love by creating a world where dominance is passion and submission is an empowered choice. This study confirms that dark romance is not merely escapist fiction, but rather an expressive contemporary space where ideas about love, consent, freedom, and power are actively redefined and constructed.