Gwen/Trent

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Pairing
Pairing: Gwen (Total Drama)/Trent (Total Drama)
Alternative name(s): GxT, TxG, Gwent
Gender category: Het
Fandom: Total Drama
Canonical?: Broken up; Friends
Prevalence: Popular Pairing
Archives: n/a
Other:
Gwen/Trent fanart by drew-winchester. Loïc and Joëlle are their names in the French dub for the series.
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Gwen/Trent, also known as Gwent, is a popular pairing within Total Drama fandom. The ship is between Gwen and Trent, both prominent characters. It has been popular since 2007, when it was teased in-universe as akin to a, "massive crush," on both sides of the ship, though Trent's was bigger. Gwen/Trent became canon in 2009 and controversially broke-up up during the same year.

In early Total Drama fandom, Gwen/Trent was third only to Courtney/Duncan and Cody/Noah in terms of fanac. Although many Total Drama fans still like the ship, fanac specifically for the pairing past the completion of Total Drama: World Tour is considered uncommon.

As of October 2023, over 245 works on Archive of Our Own are of Gwen/Trent. On FanFiction.Net, over 55 fics under the Total Drama category have "Gwent" in their summaries and over 110 have either "GxT" or "TxG".

Common Tropes

  • Camp TV!AU - Gwen and Trent are one of the few couples to have been present in Total Drama's pitch, Camp TV. Some fanworks may explore the specific dynamic they could've had if Camp TV continued, which was more adversarial. In Camp TV, they were named Heather and Trenton respectively. Heather's name was later reused for Heather, a different character.
  • Songwriter!Trent - emphasizing that Trent likes playing the guitar and writing his own songs. While some fanworks stick to canon, where he's a songwriter as a hobby, in others, it's his profession.
  • Shared Hobbies - as Gwen is Goth and Trent is a Hipster, some fanworks may expand upon these subcultures. Referencing specific musicians and/or novels they both may enjoy within fanworks is not unheard of.
  • Missing Scene - delves into how they became friends after breaking up.

Gwen/Trent Fandom

Pro-Gwen/Trent fanart by wycchy. Although this work only shows dislike towards Duncan, it also is anti-Duncan/Gwen.

Gwen/Trent shippers may dislike Duncan/Gwen and prefer Duncan romantically with Courtney. This is largely due to Total Drama: Action, as Trent's behavior over being troubled at the idea Duncan liked Gwen and vice-versa during that season caused Gwen and Trent to break-up. World Tour, which canonized Duncan/Gwen, fueled some ship war between the two pairings, though the ship war between just Courtney/Duncan and Duncan/Gwen was far more prevalent in fanac. Because Duncan cheated on Courtney in World Tour, Gwen/Trent shippers may dislike his character overall. Fanon ships getting into the ship-war picture, whether Het, Slash or Femslash, is rare but not unheard of.

Because Trent is not involved in any other canonical pairing, and their attraction was canonically stronger on Trent's end, fanworks for Gwen/Trent tend to focus more on Trent than Gwen. Early BNFs include GwennieBlack[1]. Modern BNFs include Syahaz[2] and withjust-a-bite[3]. Overall Total Drama BNF Kika-ila[4] also produces fanworks for this pairing.

In October, Gwent Week is celebrated in r/Totaldrama. December 10th is Gwent Day on Chefhatchet's Appreciation Calendar.

Fan Opinions

Because everyone who watches the show knows about Gwen/Trent, fan opinion regarding the pairing varies greatly. Trent's somewhat drastic character shift in Action is often a point of contention. The show's handling of his canonical OCD and the response to this fact by fans is discussed further on his page.

Perspectives are split into Watsonian and Doyalist for convenience on this article, as both are prevalent in meta.

Largely Watsonian

...Gwen/Trent is the main romantic course of the season and it's baffling how often these two keep repeating the same conflict over and over for short-term drama, always backpedaling on whether they're actually an item or not in the process, which means they never really have the time to consistently progress until the season's conclusion. This is especially bad with Gwen never being able to decide if she should be mad at Trent for leaving her buried alive or not, the Heather/Trent kiss which neither one should have realistically fallen for given Heather's notorious reputation for messing with people and hating everyone, and the finale in which Gwen is mad about said kiss despite forgiving Trent for it in the last episode they saw each other and knowing it wasn't his fault. Gwen in general's so fickle when it comes to facing anything challenging about either of her romances and she was only at her best in Island after Trent was voted off.

The season's so busy trying to exploit drama from these two that it spends remarkably less time actually developing their chemistry save for one, maybe two episodes max; which also means Trent as an individual is the weakest character out of any of the twelve romantic halves this season had.

They were more interesting in Action and that was the season that focused on why they're not romantically compatible.[5]

There seems to be a divide between who is to blame for the Gwent breakup. Listen guys, both Gwen and Trent screwed up. Gwen should’ve told Trent she didn’t want him throwing challenges from the first time he did it, and she should’ve asked Trent about the nine thing instead of just agreeing with Duncan’s theory. Trent should’ve been more clear about how he felt about Gwen spending so much time with Duncan, and frankly, he was getting pretty obsessed with Gwen, remember the branding himself with a G thing? At the end of the day, Gwen and Trent both poorly communicated to their significant other about how they were feeling, they both messed up.[6]

Largely Doyalist

yes-im-totaly-traumatized asked:

You know it’s been a while since I rewatched total drama but I feel like Gwen and Trent could’ve worked out like I was rooting for them:(

total-drama-takes replied:

gwent wasnt written very well b/c gwen kept fluctuating between being mad at him and not but if they were written well it would have been so good!! and honestly even in the show it's better than most people give it credit for. nobody seems to talk about gwent's potential i suppose that what they did to trent in action kinda ruined it for everyone

#imagine giving a guy ocd in one episode and having him claim he's always had it#JUST to make him annoying so they can eliminate him#inagine that.#trent deserved better his ocd deserved better#ask#td#total drama#td gwent#yes-im-totaly-traumatized[7]

Example/Notable Fanac

Winter at Central Park by GwennieBlack. AUs are common for Gwen/Trent works, particularly domestic ones.

Fan Communities/Fan Events

Fan Art

Fan Comics

Fan Fiction

Fanmixes

Fanvids

Meta

References/Further Reading

  1. ^ https://www.deviantart.com/gwennieblack
  2. ^ https://www.tumblr.com/syahaz
  3. ^ https://withjust-a-bite.tumblr.com/
  4. ^ https://www.deviantart.com/kika-ila
  5. ^ ...Gwen/Trent is the main romantic course of the season and it's baffling how often these two keep repeating the same conflict over and over for short-term drama, Archived version [JakeClipz]; posted June 22nd, 2022 on Reddit
  6. ^ There seems to be a divide between who is to blame for the Gwent breakup, Archived version posted April 29th, 2020 on Tumblr
  7. ^ You know it’s been a while since I rewatched total drama but I feel like Gwen and Trent could’ve worked out like I was rooting for them, Archived version posted May 25th, 2023 on Tumblr
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