History AllForNothing / TheOwlHouse

** Lilith cursing her sister was for nothing. The moment their witch's duel was supposed to start, Eda stepped down and let Lilith join the Emperor's Coven without a fight. All the curse ended up doing was shaming Eda for something that was never her fault to begin with.

* [[Recap/TheOwlHouseS2E12ElsewhereAndElsewhen "Elsewhere and Elsewhen"]]: Other than learning Philip's true nature, the trip back in time accomplished absolutely nothing and costs Luz a quarter of her remaining Titan's Blood. Due to a StableTimeLoop, nothing occurred in the past has any effect on the present that it didn't already have. Philip took the Collector for purposes other than perfecting the portal, so they can't find the Collector in the present and it wouldn't help Luz make a portal even if they did. Furthermore, he refuses to share his knowledge of the portal with Luz unless she agrees to more dangerous tasks, so Lilith just punches him in the face. Ultimately, the trip just explores a bit of Belos' backstory, and Luz and Lilith don't learn the connection.

* "[[Recap/TheOwlHouseS2E13AnySportInAStorm Any Sport in a Storm]]": When Amity and Luz notice the differences between the author portraits on their ''Azura'' books, they try and track the author down at a book signing, hoping to find some answers, and maybe a portal to Earth. When they finally chase the supposed author down, it turns out to be a disguised Tiny Nose, and the whole thing with the pictures was because Tibbles was trying a scam. On the side of Tibbles, since Amity is ''literally'' [[OnlyOneFindsItFun the only one buying the books in the Isles]], it's all been a net loss for him.

* "[[Recap/TheOwlHouseS2E16HollowMind Hollow Mind]]": [[Characters/TheOwlHouseTheGoldenGuard Hunter]] has worked his whole life for Belos, with his main goal at all times being to make his uncle proud and aid him in helping the people of the Boiling Isles. He then finds out that Belos has actually been lying him to him the whole time, as his real goal is to kill everyone in the Demon Realm, he doesn't care about the boy and Hunter himself is actually just the latest Grimwalker in a long line of clones he keeps killing off. Hunter is devastated to realize he was helping a psychopath who would try and kill him the second he learned the truth, and everything he'd ever done is rendered all for nought.
** On top of this, he spent the entirety of "Any Sport in a Storm" trying to prove to Darius that he was worthy of wearing the cloak of the Golden Guard. Darius fixed it up for him at the end of the episode, and told him that his predecessor would've been proud of him. After learning the AwfulTruth however, Hunter tears the cloak off his shoulders in a panic and leaves it behind on the floor of the Owl House while he runs off into the woods.
* "[[Recap/TheOwlHouseS2E17EdgeoftheWorld Edge of the World]]": While they did discover that King was a Titan, the journey to find his family was otherwise a complete waste of time, as they turned out to be a group of Titan hunters who worship the Collector. On top of potentially tipping off the Collector to the existence of another Titan, Hooty going on the trip has left the Owl House completely vulnerable, which the Emperor's Coven take full advantage at the end of the episode.

* "[[Recap/TheOwlHouseS2E20CloudsOnTheHorizon Clouds on the Horizon]]": {{Discussed|Trope}}. [[Characters/TheOwlHouseTheCollector The Collector]] showing fear of this happening to them, as they wonder if Belos is really their friend and that after helping him for centuries the Emperor may just double-cross him and not free the entity. In that same scene, the Collector taunts Belos that the human world may have dramatically changed to the point that his "success" in the Boiling Isles may not amount to anything.

** The plan to stop the Draining Spell doesn't come to fruition, as Terra has been keeping tabs on Raine for too long and is aware of their rebellion.
** Terra and all the Coven heads who supported Belos in exchange for becoming royalty in the new world are rewarded by having their magic drained like every other witch.
** All of the Boiling Isles loyal to Belos are hit by this, as the promises of the Day of Unity are revealed to be a ploy to kill them like fish in a barrel. And by extension, their ancestors are retroactively hit by this as well, as they gave up chances to learn any kind of magic they wanted, turned on their fellow witches when they refused to blindly turn to this new world order and turned the Boiling Isles into a CrapsackWorld because they swore allegiance to a selfish man who wanted them all dead.
** Also, Kikimora has spent years trying to please Belos, attempting to kill the Golden Guard, betray Luz after the human tries to help her attend her family reunion, and capture the Golden Guard and turn him over to Belos so that the emperor will grant her his approval and make her his right hand. Belos however, makes clear that he [[UngratefulBastard never had any liking for her]] regardless of her loyalty or accomplishments, and simply tells her to go find a hole to wither away in as he proceeds to move the final phase of his plan for the Day of Unity into motion, as it sinks into Kikimora that she wasted her life serving the Emperor's Coven for a man who could never come to like her. The revelation ends up [[EnemyMine prompting her to help King]] to [[SummonBiggerFish release the Collector]] for [[TheDogBitesBack the sole purpose of getting revenge]] against the man who so callously discarded her.

* "[[Recap/TheOwlHouseS3E2ForTheFuture For the Future]]": Having spent the entirety of her time within the show emotionally abusing Amity into severing her friendship with Willow to spend time with a GirlPosse not of her choice on threat of having Willow removed from Hexside, eventually following up on the threat, attempting to murder Luz, forcing Alador and his workers to work overtime to the detriment of their health, even after terminating them, and betraying the rest of witch kind to be annihilated on the Day of Unity, all of Odalia's machinations to be at the top of the Boiling Isles' society's food chain has left her in a position where she is left as little more than a glorified house maid and servant forced to perform back-breaking menial labor for the Collector, with her backstabbing, manipulative, and abusive behavior having gotten her nowhere in the end.

** Hell, Belos' goal from the very beginning, [[spoiler: to achieve prestige and praise for the annihilation of demon/witch kind was doomed to fail. Whilst he came from a time that was ''very'' anti-witch and would certainly have been commended back then, in all the centuries he's been away he's completely unaware those times aren't just looked back upon with scorn and shame, but witches are now a commercialized and outright idolized form of medium as demonstrated by this very show. In other words, Belos is pretty much the only human left believing his period's ways. Again, it's been ''hundreds of years'' and thus, a period where everyone is much more rational and above all skeptical, so if Philip, a man dressed like he'd just stepped out of the past, began to tell them about witches and demons, he'd be branded as mad. In Layman's Terms, Belos committed himself to a pointless campaign based on his bigoted views for hundreds of years, and will have '''nothing''' to show for it save the blood on his hands.]]

** Worst still, if he managed [[spoiler:to commit his witch genocide, and go back to the Human World, 'his people' would look at his now-monstrous and extremely volatile form, immediately label him as a "witch, demon, monster or whatever", and attempt to kill him in self-defense. Even if he managed to travel back in time to those that wanted the witches dead, ''[[{{Irony}} he]]'' [[{{Irony}} would fit the definition of 'evil wizard']] ''[[{{Irony}} perfectly]]'' [[{{Irony}} and be hunted down by his former friends and family]]]].

* The series starts with [[Characters/TheOwlHouseLuzNoceda Luz Noceda]] escaping to another world to avoid being sent to a summer camp that is meant to teach her how to fit in, out of fear it's going to beat all creativity and passion out of her. While her presence on Boiling Isles was beneficial to both her and many other characters, the episode "[[Recap/TheOwlHouseS2E10YesterdaysLie Yesterday's Lie]]" reveals that particular fear was completely unjustified - [[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome the only thing the camp accomplished was making weird kids meet and befriend each other, bonding over a shared crappy experience]]. This is also PlayedWith, as her presence in the Boiling Isles has dramatically improved the lives of many of the people she has met, especially Eda, Willow, King, Lilith, and Amity. Ultimately {{Subverted|Trope}}, because of Luz's actions and learning from her mistakes, she ends up in a better place than she would've had if she had gone to summer camp. While Luz did suffer from guilt and considered not going back to the demon realm when Belos is defeated, after talking with her mother and friends, Luz overcame her guilt and, by the end of the series, made a life for herself in the human and demon realm.

** In "[[Recap/TheOwlHouseS2E21KingsTide King's Tide]]", his 350 years of machination and 50 years ruling the Boiling Isles are all ruined at the climax by King freeing the Collector, who then proceeds to skip the eclipse and stop the Draining Spell after obliterating Belos, leaving him a small BlobMonster made of rotten flesh. Even if he managed to return to the Boiling Isles, after the Day of Unity nearly killed them, his former subjects would never fall for his lies again. On the other hand, the Collector's initial efforts to escape their prison are stopped by Belos refusing to free them when the time comes. It's King that frees them.
** Hell, Belos' goal from the very beginning, to achieve prestige and praise for the annihilation of demon/witch kind was doomed to fail. Whilst he came from a time that was ''very'' anti-witch and would certainly have been commended back then, in all the centuries he's been away he's completely unaware those times aren't just looked back upon with scorn and shame, but witches are now a commercialized and outright idolized form of medium as demonstrated by this very show. In other words, Belos is pretty much the only human left believing his period's ways. Again, it's been ''hundreds of years'' and thus, a period where everyone is much more rational and above all skeptical, so if Philip, a man dressed like he'd just stepped out of the past, began to tell them about witches and demons, he'd be branded as mad. In Layman's Terms, Belos committed himself to a pointless campaign based on his bigoted views for hundreds of years, and will have '''nothing''' to show for it save the blood on his hands.

** Another terrible consequence is, it is stated that if he did manage to succeed, any surviving witches would want to get revenge on humanity and create a genocide war, thus continuing the cycle of hate and violence, this time on both worlds.
** "[[Recap/TheOwlHouseS3E1ThanksToThem Thanks to Them]]": It is revealed that Philip Wittebane's initial goal was to rescue his older brother Caleb Wittebane from the so-called evil witch Evelyn. He risked life and limb through the unknown wilderness of the Boiling Isles for years, only to discover that Caleb was happier in the Boiling Isles and chose to stay with Evelyn, who's implied to become his wife. Philip, enraged by this apparent betrayal, attacked the two and ended up killing his brother, defeating the whole purpose of his journey. It's implied that his witch genocide goal grew out of a desire not to make his trip worthless.

** Hell, Belos' goal from the very beginning, to achieve prestige and praise for the annihilation of demon/witch kind was doomed to fail. Whilst he came a time that was ''very'' anti-witch and would certainly have been commended back then, in all the centuries he's been away he's completely unaware those times aren't just looked back upon with scorn and shame, but witches are now a commercialized and outright idolized form of medium as demonstrated by this very show. In other words, Belos is pretty much the only human left believing his period's ways. Again, it's been ''hundreds of years'' and thus, a period where everyone is much more rational and above all skeptical, so if Philip, a man dressed like he'd just stepped out of the past, began to tell them about witches and demons, he'd be branded as mad. In Layman's Terms, Belos committed himself to a pointless campaign based on his bigoted views for hundreds of years, and will have '''nothing''' to show for it save the blood on his hands.

** Worst still, if he managed [[spoiler:to commit his witch genocide, and go back to the Human World, 'his people' would look at his now-monstrous and extremely volatile form, immediately label him as a "witch, demon, monster or whatever", and attempt to kill him in self-defense. Even if he managed to travel back in time to those that wanted the witches dead, ''he'' would fit the definition of 'evil wizard' ''perfectly'' and be hunted down by his former friends and family]].

** Worst still, if he managed [[spoiler: to commit his witch genocide, and go back to the Human World from his own age, his people would immediately label him as a “witch, demon, monster or whatever”, and attempt to murder him for witchcraft]].

* [[Characters/TheOwlHouseLilithClawthorne Lilith Clawthorne]] ends up with a couple instances of her plans being rendered moot.

** Another terrible impact is, it is stated that if he did managed to succeeded any surviving witches would caused a spark to get revenge on humanity and create a genocide war and thus continuing the cycle of hate and violence and this time on both worlds.