Parental Incest: Difference between revisions

* The French film ''Ma Mère'' has a very complicated incestuous relationship between a mother and her son.

* And let's not forget the infamous "bath scene" in [[Pia Zadora]]'s [[So Bad It's Good|classic]] ''Butterfly''.

** The original novel was much more explicit about this, hence the film's notoriety even ''before'' the Kennedy assassinations.

** Strangely, the '60s version with the Hays Code in full force was actually ''more'' explicit with this than the later remake. That was '''not''' a motherly kiss.

* In ''[[Psycho]] IV'', it is revealed that Norman Bates and his mother had a really really... ''odd'' relationship, wherein she apparently teased him sexually in his adolescence and then punished him for his [[Raging Stiffie|natural reactions]]. As a result, he lusted after his mother and was jealous of her many boyfriends, and assumed the reverse was true, which resulted in a woman being knifed in the shower some 20 years after Mrs. Bates died. It is not clear if they ever consummated this or if he just had one hell of an Oedipus complex.

* Played for laughs in ''[[Nanny McPhee]]'', when Great-Aunt Adelaide Stitch assumes that Cedric intends to marry one of his daughters, Evangeline, to fulfill her demand that he remarry within the month. While Cedric did plan on marrying Evangeline, she was his scullery maid and not actually his daughter. That he is marrying a servant seems to bother her more than the idea of incest.

* Part of [[The Reveal]] about [[Whoopi Goldberg]]'s character in ''Clara's Heart'' is that {{spoiler|she was raped by her son, who then killed himself}}.

* Implied between {{spoiler|Nina and her mother}} in ''[[Black Swan]]''. Fan debate rages heavily.

** In ''[[Farnham's Freehold]]'', Farnham's daughter mentions to him that, of the three men she's been stranded with, he's the one she'd prefer to father her child (if she weren't already pregnant just now). Her dad is completely undisturbed and in fact flattered by this.

** In ''[[The Number of the Beast]]'', Lazarus Long's free-spirited ways inspire protagonists Deety and Jacob (her father) to do the deed.

* Invoked in ''[[The Silence of the Lambs|Red Dragon]]'', when the FBI agents claim that the eponymous [[Serial Killer]] "may have had sexual relations with his mother" as part of the highly sensational smokescreen that they feed to the press, because they specifically want to offend him into doing something stupid. In actuality, the killer's [[Freudian Excuse]] is significantly less [[Freud Was Right|Freudian]], though still fairly [[Squick|effed up]].

* The title character of [[Stephen King]]'s ''Dolores Claiborne'' had an asshole husband who, among other things, was trying to get into the pants of his own teenage daughter. This was one of several factors that eventually led to Dolores killing him.

* In [[Isaac Asimov]]'s ''Robots of the Dawn'', there is a planet with such loose morals, that one of the characters ''received a lifelong trauma when her father refused to become her first man''. And ''he'' could never figure out why he refused.

* [[Dean Koontz]] uses [[Villainous Incest|non-consensual incestuous relationships]] fairly frequently in character backstories. In addition to the [[Brother-Sister Incest]] that figures into ''The Bad Place'', in both ''Whispers'' and ''Life Expectancy'', a major character is the product of a father raping his daughter. Additionally, in ''What the Night Knows'', a major character is the product of three generations of line-breeding in his family, starting with a brother-sister pairing, then the father/uncle impregnating his daughter/niece, then impregnating his twin granddaughters/grandnieces, one of whom is the mother of the character in question. The other twin and her daughter (also fathered by the family patriarch) state in their last documented conversation with their relative that they're both about a month pregnant.

** Similarly in ''Up the Line'', by [[Robert Silverberg]], one of the Couriers, who has some ''major'' father issues, has a goal to sleep with every female ancestor he has, as a gesture of contempt toward their mates.

* In [[Octavia Butler]]'s ''Imago'', almost all of the human race has been rendered sterile. At least one woman and at least one man are still fertile, though—we know because she gets pregnant. He runs away immediately after the conception and is never seen again, so the only way to [[Adam and Eve Plot|perpetuate the species]] is in fact mother/son incest.

* After Bill O'Reilly was interviewed on ''[[The Colbert Report]]'' and [http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/182583/january-25-2007/right-away- made an accidental] [[Double Entendre]] about how impressed he was by [[Stephen Colbert]]'s interviewing skills, Colbert revealed that he and O'Reilly had had sex. While not technically related, O'Reilly is the inspiration for the Colbert character, who sees him as [["Well Done, Son" Guy|the father he never had]] and calls him "[[Everything's Worse with Bears|Papa Bear]]". It's more than a little [[squick]]y.

* ''[[The Practice]]'' had an episode involving a case about this. It was very vague about whether or not they actually had sex and who was the aggressor was, which was part of what the case hinged on. In the end it showed the mother sleeping peacefully and the son watching her, implying he was in love with her.

** And in an earlier episode, Agent Henriksen tells Dean that he thinks [["Well Done, Son" Guy|John]] brainwashed Dean into believing that demons and ghosts are real and probably molested him as a child. Of course, Henriksen said this just to make Dean angry.

** And in "Family Remains", the antagonist is first believed to be the ghost the daughter of the first victim. After all of the standard ghost-warding stuff fails, they figure out it was the dead daughter's daughter, who was a result of her father/grandfather raping her mother/half-sister. Jeez, these geneologies get complicated.

* On ''[[Roar]]'' Fergus is initially quite attracted to Molly until he realizes that she's his daughter.

* In the [[Doctor Who]] episode ''Father's Day'', Rose's father Pete unknowingly invokes it in a hypothetical remark of "if I was going out with you" and is confused about her emphatic, repeated protests.

 

== Music ==

* "Alive" by [[Pearl Jam]] is about a mother who reveals to her son that the man he thought was his father was actually his stepfather... and then she makes advances on her son because he looks like his dead (birth) father.

** Seeing as [[Something Something Leonard Bernstein|no-one has ever understood a word Eddie Vedder sings in any of their songs]], this has yet to be confirmed or refuted.

** "Daughter" ''sounds'' rather explicit in its subject matter (Father/Daughter incest), once you get past Vedder's nigh-unintelligible singing voice. Though it reads like that ("she holds the hand that holds her down"), "Daughter" is actually about a child with dyslexia ("mother reads aloud - child tries to understand it"), whose parents don't understand her disability and use harsh physical punishment to deal with it ("the shades go down"). Explained [[wikipedia:Daughter (song)#cite note-3|here]] on [[The Other Wiki]].

* No sex happens, but the video for "[http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=LE06lqT0Y2g Lemon Incest]" by Serge Gainsbourg and his young daughter Charlotte is extremely creepy.

 

== Tabletop Games ==

** Another D&D example, this time being the squickier grandparental incest; Lolth, evil goddess of the drow, forced her grandson, a drow war-god, to be her bodyguard and consort for a long time before he was killed off. He apparently hated both positions.

* In [[Warhammer Fantasy Battle]] the Dark Elf Witch King Malekith and his mother Morathi are strongly implied to be lovers. Given that Morathi is a devoted follower of Slaanesh and will screw [[Anything That Moves]], this is likely true.

* In ''[[Spring Awakening]]'' one of the boys is said to have had a wet dream about his mother, and also {{spoiler|the characters of Martha and Ilse are/were both sexually abused by their fathers.}}

* In ''[[The Marriage of Figaro]]'' (both the Mozart opera and the original Beaumarchais play), Marcellina is determined to make Figaro follow through on a contractual obligation to marry her. Until it's discovered that Figaro is her [[Incest Is Relative|long-lost bastard child]].

{{quote|'''The Play:''' The pages' clothes get ripped off, revealing female genitalia. The Duke recognizes his daughter's.

'''Everyone:''' ... }}

* ''[[Family Guy]]'' plays up this vibe deliberately with Chris, who has a pretty obvious attraction to his mother Lois. She seems more or less oblivious to it, and it's always [[Played for Laughs]] as a [[Running Gag]], but a brief scene in the extra material of [[The Movie|the movie's]] DVD showed just what it would look like if the writers ever decided to do something serious with it.

** In "Airport '07", when Peter wants to be a redneck, he tries to hit on Meg, using the [[Yawn and Reach]]. She runs away screaming.

** One episode also has a joke in this vein about ''[[Gilmore Girls]]'' characters Lorelai and Rory Gilmore.

** From [[The Movie]]: "Now that we've practiced kissing and cuddling, we'll practice eating out... at a fancy restaurant!"