I've also seen the "Joe thought romance just wasn't for him, no matter who his friends tried to hook him up with *cue montage of four people with the last one put up as the stereotypical gag/punchline setup*, but it wasn't until a chance encounter with the mafia that..." narrative way too many times. However, I think now you don't even have to go to the level of it being insulting to aros, because the storyline has been done just far too many times. It's the kind of plotline that you can trope and make fun of.
I think a good first step for this sort of media is to have just a really well written bildigungsroman for an aro. I tried to write some fanfic to fit that for myself, but looking back at it...it's just bad and it's so hamfisted. Personally, I want such a story where the character goes from something like this:
Full of anger or maybe even possible jealousy, to an acceptance that feels like this:
of just this calm, mature tranquility of having roughed the seas of young adulthood.
In fact, that first image from Bloom Into You was a series I was heavily into (before I learned the English translation of the title, which would have been a heavy hint, and until it turned into yet another "They fall in love in the end" cliche), because to even think of a character reacting to someone else feeling attraction with jealousy because they don't feel that is just so unique to read that it feels incredibly refreshing.
I want that sensation again.
