TV shows and movies have pushed boundaries over the years by exploring incest on screen.
The White Lotus is the most recent example, with Patrick Schwarzenegger‘s Saxon and Sam Nivola‘s Lochlan confusing Us with a kiss that should not be taking place between brothers. Luckily, HBO’s hit show is known for messing with its audience by throwing out crazy story lines as conversation-starters about bigger topics.
“I think that one of the things that we worked on as a group, as a family, was to try to create that dynamic. The closeness, but the oddness, the weirdness [that] we thought was normal, the older brother to younger brother relationship,” Schwarzenegger told RadioTimes in March 2025. “But I think that Saxon actually really does care about his brother. He cares about his sister. And I think that the relationship with his brother – although it’s very odd and weird, which is what [creator] Mike [White] wanted — it’s still very loving at the same time.”
Before The White Lotus there was Netflix’s Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menéndez Story making headlines for sexually charged moments between a fictional version of real siblings. The series was released in late 2024 and viewers immediately questioned why Monsters was marketing convicted murderers Lyle and Erik Menéndez as sexual partners.
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Erik subsequently slammed the show for how it approached their story.
“I believed we had moved beyond the lies and ruinous character portrayals of Lyle, creating a caricature of Lyle rooted in horrible and blatant likes rampant in the show,” read a statement from Erik that was shared on Lyle’s Facebook page in September 2024. “I can only believe they were done so on purpose. It is with a heavy heart that I say, I believe Ryan Murphy cannot be this naive and inaccurate about the facts of our lives so as to do this without bad intent.”
Keep scrolling for more instances when TV shows and movies shared incest story lines:
‘Bates Motel’
A&E’s Bates Motel had five seasons to dig into the origins of Psycho‘s Norman Bates (Freddie Highmore). And there would be no Norman without his mother Norma (Vera Farmiga). Their connection didn’t fully cross the line into romantic but the emotional undertones were enough to make Us feel uneasy. By the end of the series, Norma came to realize how dangerous Norman’s devotion to her was — but it was ultimately too late.
‘House of the Dragon’
Game of Thrones’ Jaime Lannister (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) and sister Cersei’s (Lena Headey) romance walked so House of the Dragon could run. If there was any show that found a way to make the audience root for a love story between an uncle and his niece, it’s House of the Dragon. Daemon (Matt Smith) and Rhaenyra’s (Emma D’Arcy) chemistry spanned years until they finally got together after crossing paths again when she was an adult.
‘A Simple Favor’
The 2018 film took a chance on a few changes from Darcey Bell‘s book of the same name. The biggest was Stephanie (Anna Kendrick) admitting that, as a teenager, she had sex with her half-brother, Chris (Dustin Milligan), at her father’s funeral. Good thing Blake Lively‘s Emily never let her — or Us — forget it.
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‘Monsters’
Ryan Murphy is no stranger to creating a show that starts a conversation. But Monsters became a pop culture phenomenon in part because of the backlash to scenes between Lyle Menéndez (Nicholas Alexander Chavez) and brother Erik Menéndez (Cooper Koch).
In the first episode, which premiered in 2024, Lyle — who was on drugs — kissed Erik on the lips. The show later featured a sequence where the brothers were seen taking a shower together. (The real Erik and Lyle never claimed to have been involved in a romantic or sexual relationship. Lyle specifically testified at his murder trial in 1994 that he never had a sexual relationship with his brother.)
‘The White Lotus’
As soon as Saxon asked Lochlan what porn he was into, the vibes were off in season 3. Then Lochlan watched Saxon walk around their hotel room naked. Then Saxon made it his mission to help his younger brother lose his virginity and it all went downhill from there. The good news? The White Lotus still has time to push the envelope even further.
‘Sons of Anarchy’
During the third season of the hit FX series, Jax (Charlie Hunnam) almost slept with Trinity (Zoe Boyle) before finding out that she is his half-sister. Sons of Anarchy narrowly avoided going down the incest rabbit hole, but they were close enough that we are still talking about it.
‘Degrassi’
Holly J. (Charlotte Arnold) wasn’t the only one with questions about the twincest kiss heard around the world. Fiona (Annie Clark) caught just about everyone off guard when she pulled brother Declan (Landon Liboiron) in for a kiss. But, it was never explained whether there was actually a plan to touch on that close connection between the siblings.
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‘New Girl’
Sometimes there is no better way to put a stop to a TV couple than by making them first cousins. Take Jess (Zooey Deschanel) and Robby (Nelson Franklin), for example. They were never meant to last while Nick (Jack Johnson) existed, so New Girl took the easy way out by making them related and moving the story along.
‘Flowers in the Attic’
Based on V. C. Andrews’ book series, Flowers in the Attic, If There Be Thorns and Seeds of Yesterday, the show played with the idea of forbidden romance spanning generations in one family. Kiernan Shipka and Mason Dye kicked it off as siblings Cathy and Christopher, respectively.
‘Passions’
While Whitney (Brook Kerr) and Chad (Donn Swaby and Charles Divins) were ultimately not blood relatives, the spiral they went through on the soap opera makes them worthy of being on this list. Whitney was so guilt-ridden about potentially dating her half-brother — with whom she has a child — that she briefly became a nun. Talk about memorable.
