Obnoxious In-Laws: Difference between revisions

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{{quote|''"When are you going to learn that In-Laws are your natural enemies?"''|'''Dan,''' [[Dan Vs.]]}}

A [[Happily Married]] couple faces various problems, but none quite like the [[Sitcom]] In-Law. A member of one of the couple's family (often the wife's) has an obvious animosity towards their relative's spouse. They hate the person their daughter/sister/son/brother is married to and aren't shy about reaffirming it. While the object of this hate always tries to be nice to them (often at the insistence of their partner/spouse), the in-laws pull out all the stops to ridicule, abuse and undermine their target, and even try to set up their relative with somebody else, in spite of being married, and their spouse still living. Most of the time, they hate the poor guy for no reason [[Why Couldn't You Be Different?|other than not being a millionaire.]] Occasionally the hate stems from a [[Disproportionate Retribution|past incident that the hero/heroine has long since made up for.]] Or it could just be some people are... [[Jerkass|just jerks.]]

Such in laws can also be a [[Bitch in Sheep's Clothing]] or [[Devil in Plain Sight]] if their relative is oblivious to their jerkishness, or insists that they aren't so bad. Sometimes overlaps with [[Coattail-Riding Relative]]. See also [[Evil Matriarch]], [[Love-Obstructing Parents]].

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* The parents of the female protagonist of ''[[Hana Yori Dango]]'' would push her to the first rich boy to show interest and even enrolled her into a high-class High School (despite [[Perpetual Poverty|hardly having money for anything else]]) [[Gold Digger|just to increase the chances.]] When one of those boys showed up for a visit, her parents considered him a punk until they learned who he was.

** They're still nothing compared with the [[Evil Matriarch]] of a mother that the male lead has. She not only is abusive to Hell and back to her son and daughter, but treats the heroine like complete SHIT.

== Comics ==

* Inverted in ''[[FoxTrot]]''. Andy herself dreads her mother's visits because the whole family absolutely adores her and she feels pushed to the sides.

* [[Cathy]]'s in-laws are absolutely annoying.

* In [[Superman]], General Sam Lane did not approve of Lois marrying mild-mannered reporter, Clark Kent, feeling that he was too much of a wimp, and even threatened to not attend their wedding. In all fairness, according to Lois's sister, he's hated all of his daughters' beaus. For the record, he wasn't very fond of Superman either [[Fantastic Racism|because he didn't trust aliens.]]

== Fan Works ==

* Women aren't immune to this trope either, as the title character of ''[[Troper Works/Ultimate Spider Woman|Ultimate Spider-Woman: Change with the Light]]'' will tell you. Ben Reilly's parents both hate Mary Jane Watson and are fairly open about it, especially when Andrew becomes an [[Overprotective Dad]] and outright ''threatens'' Mary Jane if she doesn't stop dating his son. When he finds out about it, Ben is not amused.

* In the 'In My Eyes' stories latest chapter, Megatron outright says he'll kill {{spoiler|Sarah if she doesn't break up with Will.}}

== Jokes ==

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{{quote|'''Ginny:''' I suppose I'm just going to have to accept that he really is going to marry her.

'''Harry:''' She's alright. ''(hastily)'' Ugly, though. }}

* [[Older Than Feudalism]]: In ''[[The Bible]]'', Rebekah is "vexed" by the wives of Esau. It seems to be mostly because they are Canaanites, and follow Canaanite traditions and customs, worshipping their gods instead of the God of Abraham.

== Films -- Live-Action ==

* In ''[[The Ref]]'', this is played straight with the mother-in-law from hell Rose Chasseur, but subverted with both of her sons' families. Brother and sister-in-law Gary and Connie Chasseur initially seem like classic obnoxious in-laws, but they become slightly sympathetic characters when it turns out they're as fed up with "Mother Rose" as everybody else.

{{quote|'''Gus:''' ''(holding a gun to Mrs. Chasseur's head)'' Nobody move or I'll shoot!

'''Connie:''' Go ahead, kill her. }}

** Plus, even though the main couple played by Kevin Spacey and Judy Davis get the [[Sympathetic POV]], it's clear that ''they'' could just as easily be considered obnoxious in-laws themselves.

* This is basically the plot of the 2005 movie ''[[Monster-in-Law]]''.

* ''[[Eat Drink Man Woman]]'' has Madam Liang, who spends almost all of her screen time berating her daughters as burdensome and insulting the men they married. She is visibly elated when her daughter in America gets divorced, and vows to mount the divorce papers over the toilet.

* Robert De Niro's character in ''[[Meet the Parents]]'' is this to the Nth degree, trying everything to ruin the life of his daughter's latest fiancé. It gets to the point that you wonder why she doesn't say or do anything to stop it, particularly when its mentioned he does this with every boy she brings home.

* An [[Implied Trope|offscreen example]] in ''[[Get Smart]]''. Dalip, [[The Brute]] working for KAOS, has a hellish sister-in-law who's constantly undermining his relationship with his wife and trying to break them up, which causes him endless grief at home. Max manages to keep Dalip from killing him by giving him advice on how to keep his wife and her sister from spending too much time together without looking like the bad guy.

* ''[[It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World]]'' has Milton Berle hounded by his harridan mother-in-law (Ethel Merman) and hipster-doofus brother-in-law (Dick Shawn). In all fairness, his own wife (Dorothy Provine), faced with the opportunity, shows a desire to flee them all.

* ''[[Fargo]]'' has the obnoxiousness of Jerry Lundegaard's father-in-law Wade Gustafson be one of the primary ways that Jerry's [[Batman Gambit]] turns into a ''very'' dark [[Fawlty Towers Plot]].

* ''[[Guess Who]]'' features a Caucasian man dating an African-American whose father would rather have her dating a fellow African-American.

* Brought up in ''[[Addams Family]] Reunion'' by Morticia: when Gomez asks if she's noticed anything strange about his grandparents, who are visiting, her response is:

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* On ''[[How I Met Your Mother]]'', Marshall's mother hates Lily. It probably has something to do with the way Lily ran off on Marshall a couple of months before their wedding. They eventually made it up, but it would appear Marshall's mother never forgot.

* Alicia Florrick in ''[[The Good Wife]]'' does not like her mother-in-law. This is demonstrated by the fact that the ring tone allocated to her on her cell phone is the music from ''[[The Twilight Zone]]''.

* In ''[[That 70s Show]]'', Red Forman's mother, Bernice is incredibly obnoxious and rude to everyone, but especially to her daughter-in-law, Kitty. Kitty's own mother is not much better - however, she upsets Kitty more than Red.

* In ''[[That '70s Show]]'', Red Forman's mother, Bernice is incredibly obnoxious and rude to everyone, but especially to her daughter-in-law, Kitty. Kitty's own mother is not much better - however, she upsets Kitty more than Red.

* Of the four main adult characters from ''[[Yes, Dear]]'', three of them have an in-law for each: Don (Kim and Christine's father) for Greg, Jenny (Kim and Christine's mother) for Jimmy, and Natalie (Greg's mother) for Kim. Christine doesn't have this problem, though. On the other hand, considering the tension that exists between brothers-in-law Greg and Jimmy, much of the show has this trope as its premise.

* In ''[[The Honeymooners]]'', Ralph dreads the visits of his mother-in-law, because she constantly implies that Alice could've done better than him.

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* Bob Duncan's mother-in-law of ''[[Good Luck Charlie]]'' thinks he's a pea-brained buffoon who's done a deplorable job of raising his kids.

* In ''[[Life with Derek]]'', Nora's mother Felicia liked her first husband just fine, but doesn't care at all for her current husband George, mostly because she doesn't believe in divorce.

* An unusual variant occurs on ''[[Blossom]]'' between her father Nick Russo and her maternal grandfather Buzz Richman. Buzz doesn't really have anything against Nick, but Nick resents him for coming to the Russo house and sponging off them when he visits. The fact that Buzz's daughter abandoned Nick and the kids doesn't exactly help matters.

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== Video Games ==

* One of the [[Crowning Moment of Funny|funniest]] examples is in ''[[Dragon's Lair]] II: Time Warp''. The ''entire'' first level has Dirk trying to escape Daphne's mother (who resembles [[Brawn Hilda|a retired opera star]]... boy, even her name is Hilda!). She starts chasing Dirk with a rolling pin after she finds out that he let Daphne get kidnapped again. If the player presses the wrong button, Dirk can actually get ''killed'' by her! Dirk runs away from her on a horse, but she starts following him on an ''ox'', trying to bash the living daylights out of him while telling him to go rescue Daphne.

{{quote|'''Hilda:''' ''[[This Is Gonna Suck|DIIIIIIIIIIIRRRRKK!!!]]''<br />

'''Dirk:''' Uh-oh...<br />

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* In ''[[Spider-Man: The Animated Series]]'', Mary Jane's aunt Anna has nothing but bad things to say about Peter in spite of the fact that Peter was never anything but courteous towards her. She sets out to find fault in every little thing he says/does.

** Hell, at one point she sics ''[[The Punisher]]'' on him!(Albeit unintentionally)

*** Thankfully it's mostly averted by her comicbook counterpart whom is basically a more grounded version of Aunt May (and helped May set them up in the first place).

* In ''[[American Dad]]'', Francine's Chinese adoptive parents don't have any bad feelings for Stan, however whenever they show up they tend to take over the place.

{{quote|'''Stan:''' They're loud, they're pushy, they make me feel like a guest in my own house!}}

** Stan hates them so much that he actually goes in search of Francine's birth parents. After initially thinking they are wonderful, Stand finds out that they are much worse and abandoned Francine because they would have had to fly ''coach'' since babies weren't allowed in the first class cabin.

* In ''[[The Fairly Odd Parents]]'', Mama Cosma is this to Wanda and Big Daddy is this to Cosmo.

** In "Timmy Turnip", Timmy's maternal grandparents keep referring to Dad as the "son-in-law that we don't like" and, as a [[Running Gag]], gives him bags full of rabid wesels.

* Linda's mother in the second episode of ''[[Bob's Burgers]]'' so grates on Bob that he hides from her by pretending to be stuck inside the wall. [[Hilarity Ensues]], but by the end of the episode they seem to be patching things up.

* In one episode of ''[[Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog]]'', Robotnik is about to marry the guest character of the week. His mother crashes the wedding and instantly starts a room-destroying fist fight with the bride, for no apparent reason.

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* In most cultures, a man cannot even speak to his wife's parents. This trope is the Western form of this.

* The tired comedy cliché that a man's wife's mother is a bitch towards him is quite baffling, considering that in real life it's ''far'' more common for the husband's mother to [[My Beloved Smother|conflict with his wife]]. Might be a result of a [[Double Standard]]: "Meh, women are always arguing with each other, but what did ''I'' do?"

* There's a joke that goes like this:

{{quote|Q: "What's the difference between in-laws and outlaws?"

A: "Outlaws are ''wanted''!" }}