Need help with establishing a misunderstanding

[satine]

Thanks for the suggestion. I intend to work that in as well in a humourous way. I've ended up deciding against puns and verbal misunderstandings: too wordy for a young audience and won't translate readily when the show's sold on the international market. So it will be birthmark, plus the cousin being able to roll her tongue which no other member of the family can do, and from there on the overimaginative hero will leap to the conclusion that the only explanation is for his cousin to have been adopted...

[padnar]

Hi,
The hero can tell that a child born to cousins
will be defective or have some problems
padma

[satine]

Thanks for the advice. That’s precisely what I was going to go for in my first draft, but I was told divorce is a subject we can’t broach in the series as it’s being “saved” for the feature film that’s being adapted from the show. Which is why I was exploring new options with the possibility of a misunderstanding around adoption. I think I’ve figured out what to do about the birthmark, i.e the hero thinks it’s a mark that sets his cousin apart from the family, proving that she’s adopted, only to realize in the end that it’s in fact a hickey she got from her actual boyfriend. But to cement his adoption theory, I still think I need something more than just this visual confusion, like some kind of play on words, something figurative he misinterprets literally… Ah well, better keep looking I guess! 

[ScriptNurse]

How about a vividly-imagined divorce?

[satine]

I’m writing a 7-minute animation script for a comedy cartoon aimed at children 9-12. In this episode the 11 year-old hero watches a home video at a family gathering that shows him and his female cousin in a mock-wedding ceremony when they were both little children. Because the main characteristic of this hero is that he has a vivid imagination, he takes things literally and comes to believe that he actually has been – and still is – married to his now adolescent cousin. Although he’s always had a childish crush on her, he realizes that marrying one’s first cousin is in fact frowned upon, and must find a way out of it. One way would be for him to misinterpret something he overhears or sees as proof that his cousin is adopted, which in reality she is not. The character of his cousin already exists and unfortunately doesn’t have any obvious physical trait that could set her apart from the rest of the family and trigger the hero’s adoption theory. So I’m basically looking for some ground to base this misunderstanding on, be it some phrase with a double entendre he hears and leads him to believe his cousin’s adopted, or some hidden birth mark he spots on her. It doesn’t have to be watertight because although it’s a somewhat realistic show it’s still a cartoon, but ideally it should be funny or even a little whacky because this is above all a comedy series and a sitcom for children. Any advice would be much appreciated!