This reveals a crucial insight about consumption: context collapses. Consumers take the iconography (swords, parties, balconies, young beauty) and discard the context (patriarchy, revenge, clumsy apothecaries). They are building a dream from the rubble of a tragedy.
Because social media thrives on suspense. Once a couple in a show gets together safely, the audience loses interest. The R&J dream keeps the "will they/won't they" fatalistic forever.
Musicized Moment (Duet concept)
In Baldur’s Gate 3 , the romance arc with the vampire spawn Astarion is a masterclass in the dream dynamic. You are literally forbidden to touch him without consequence; he is a monster trying to reclaim his humanity. The "dream" is the fantasy of fixing someone through love—a powerful, if problematic, offshoot of the Shakespearean model.