Basic Trope: Someone has an affair with their partner's relative
- Straight:
- Alice has an affair with her husband Bob's brother Dave.
- Bob has an affair with his mother-in-law, Aerith.
- Exaggerated:
- All of Bob's children are actually his nephews because of Alice's long-term affair with his brother Dave.
- Alice slept with all of Bob's brothers, and his father to boot.
- Bob has been carrying an affair with his mother-in-law Aerith for the entirety of his marriage.
- Downplayed:
- Alice and/or Bob playfully flirt with their in-laws.
- After Bob dies, Alice marries his brother Dave. This is considered taboo and semi-incestuous by the standards of her culture.
- Justified:
- Alice and Bob are in a loveless marriage. She considers his brother Dave a Replacement Goldfish for what she used to see in Bob.
- Bob wanted to marry Aerith in the first place, but had to marry Alice instead. So he takes her as his mistress and emotional lover.
- The relatives always hated each other, and one cuckolding the other is seen as payback.
- Bob was a Stalker with a Test Tube towards Alice and her family genes. The more members of her family he can impregnate, the better.
- Living vicariously through her daughter turns out to be not enough for Aerith so she does the deed herself.
- Bob and Dave where fighting always Alice, and her choosing Bob does not mean that he has won.
- Inverted: Alice and Bob hate their in-laws
- Subverted: Bob believes that his brother Dave is sleeping with his wife, but it turns out they were Mistaken for Cheating and are simply friendly in-laws.
- Double Subverted: Alice may be just friends with Dave, but she is having an affair with Bob's father George.
- Averted: No-one sleeps with their partner's relatives.
- Enforced:
- "Let's show how much of a Jerkass a character is by bedding their relative's spouse!"
- The writers want to make infidelity even more dramatic with it being a family drama as well.
- Defied:
- Alice propositions Dave, but he turns her down because he doesn't want to hurt Bob.
- Alice is the one who turns down Dave's advances, being disgusted how he could be such a bad brother.
- Invoked: Aerith marries Bob to her daughter as an excuse to keep him around. She then tells him that he ought to be willing to cheat on his wife given she is willing to cheat on her husband.
- Played For Drama:
- The family affair tears the family of the cheated spouse and affair partner, and the relatives never reconcile.
- Alice is forced into a loveless marriage just so her mother can get a young lover for herself.
- Implied: Bob has always had a thing for older women and Aerith fits several of his personality and body types.
Back to A Family Affair.
