4. Friends and Relatives Become Involved
Remember being in school and your friends used to tell you they had a thing for your mother, sister or cousin? Well once you all grow up most of those little jokes and comments disappear. In some cases, however, a friend may have actually been serious about it and in even rarer cases they may decide to act upon it and try their luck. Sitcoms love this dynamic, and there are a ton of excellent examples of how they employ it. To begin with we need to look no further than the absolute powerhouse of the genre that is 'Friends'. The show ran for ten seasons, and during the course of that nearly every main character had an encounter, brief or otherwise, with a member of another's family. We have Ross kissing Rachel's sister, Chandler kissing Joey's sister (and forgetting which one!) and even Ross with Chandler's mother. In these laughs come from the resulting resentment from the person who feels they've been wronged and the culprit's flailing attempts at explaining or justifying their actions. These are brief examples of such interactions, but 'Friends' was also responsible for the biggest 'friend plus sibling' relationship ever when Chandler and Monica got together. The comedy here was derived from their sneaking around behind the other characters' backs and the eventual reveal of their relationship. 'Friends' isn't the only sitcom to have employed this well, though, and there are tons of other examples. From 'Scrubs' pairing up Elliot with JD's brother to Barney's apparent encounter with Ted's sister in 'How I Met Your Mother' there are an absolute plethora of ways in which the romantic 'friend plus relative' can be played out. This is truly a sitcom plot that will never die!