People left stunned after watching scene from very first episode of Airline

Watching old reruns of British television has its highlights, but also can come with a lot of culture shocks.

In 2024, there are just some things that we no longer do as a society which might have been more normal in the 90s.

For example, one X user got the shock of her life when watching the first episode of a 1998 reality TV show that was beloved at the time, only to find out a disturbing detail halfway through.

The show in question? Airline.

The TV series contained multiple seasons, one which focussed on the flight crew of Britannia Airways and the others which continued following EasyJet staff until 2007.

It was a great show that saw the realities of UK airports and flight attendants, as well as bagging crew and checking receptionists.

But re-watching it could mean that you’re letting yourself in for a shock.

For @Jobonomatopoeia, it was something they didn’t expect to be said on screen.

It was the very first episode which saw two women in a home preparing to pack bags ready for one of the women to fly to her wedding.

Within the home was a little girl and presumably it was her mum who was jetting off to be wed.

It was initially a nice moment until the camera switched to a different scene which showed her husband-to-be walking up the path with his own suitcase and the voice over quickly told the viewers something horrifying.

The voice called him the woman’s ‘childhood sweetheart’ and then, ‘her cousin’.

That’s not a sentence you’d hear strung together nowadays.

In the clip, which was posted to the social media platform, you can hear the user say, ‘sorry, what?’ right after their familial relationship was revealed.

Watched the very first episode of Airline earlier and couldn’t quite believe my ears…. pic.twitter.com/QVupgOxKsS

— Jobo (@Jobonomatopoeia) July 8, 2024

But before you cry that it’s illegal to marry your first cousin, I’ve got some pretty dire news for you.

According to Citizens Information, it’s totally legal in the UK to marry your first cousin, and while it’s very rare for it to happen, it does in fact happen to this day.

Anyway, understandably people were shocked to hear that in the clip and took to the comments to express their shock.

One person wrote about some other scenes to expect in the upcoming episodes: “Watched exactly the same thing a couple of weeks ago. Absolutely stunning and it only gets better as it goes on. The man who refuses to roll his bag along the ground to try to prove that he isn’t gay is another highlight.”

Another wrote: “Literally me everytime I see this.

“Like…third cousin…right? Right?”

Someone else said: “Even more disturbing than the incest is you leaving the volume on 31. The f*ck?”

Another said: “Tbf to her - he’s an absolute ride with that 2 piece shell suit and tache combo.”

However, it was never considered to be incestuous - at least by law.

The Book of Common Prayer of 1662, which created legally binding laws for certain communities in the UK stated that men could not marry their step-grandmothers, grandmothers, grandmother-in law, aunt, aunt-in-law, mother, step-mother, mother-in-law, daughter, step-daughter, daughter-in-law, sister, sister-in-law, granddaughter, granddaughter-in-law, step-granddaughter, niece or niece-in-law.

For around 350 years, those rules applied to men and women and never once mentioned a cousin.

Weird, right?