History ItsAllAboutMe / LiveActionTV

* ''Series/{{Full House}}'': Jesse into feeling the same way (he was eager to move out before Michelle started complaining). Ultimately, Michelle gets her way, and Jesse and Rebecca remodel the house's attic to become a private apartment -- and even then, Michelle is prone to barging in and demanding attention.

* Gilmore Girls: For all her natural positive qualities (empathy, curiosity, intelligent) Rory Gilmore is a RIDICULOUSLY self centered human being (she actually once compared her getting arrested for stealing a yacht to Dr Martin Luther King Jr, a man arrested for marching for equality, and the person talking to her reacted appropriately). To be fair, it is not entirely her fault. She was raised by a teenage mother with a SEVERE case of arrested development (Lorelai talks, acts, and dresses like a 16 year old girl) who raised her as more of a surrogate sister/ best friend than daughter and who refuses to believe Rory is anything less than perfection personified, has old money grandparents who constantly buy her whatever she wants and pays for everything, grew up in a town where everyone adored her, had no trouble getting any guy she wanted, and was constantly told she was the smartest/best at whatever she did. Reality smacks her HARD in the face anytime she has to deal with someone who doesn’t buy into her reputation and isn’t from Stars Hollow.

* ''Series/{{Full House}}'':Jesse into feeling the same way (he was eager to move out before Michelle started complaining). Ultimately, Michelle gets her way, and Jesse and Rebecca remodel the house's attic to become a private apartment -- and even then, Michelle is prone to barging in and demanding attention.

** Note that Phoebe's being sarcastic in that quote. Monica definitely has these tendancies too, especially [[{{Bridezilla}} around the time of her wedding]] or any time there's some sort of competition going on. Jesse into feeling the same way (he was eager to move out before Michelle started complaining). Ultimately, Michelle gets her way, and Jesse and Rebecca remodel the house's attic to become a private apartment -- and even then, Michelle is prone to barging in and demanding attention.

* ''Series/BreakingBad'': Walter White. Originally [[JustifiedCriminal having turned to cooking crystal meth to pay his hospital bills and provide some extra money for his family should he die]], his motivations increasingly turn to serving his own ego and hunger for power. He even says this word-for-word in the Season 4 episode "Cornered," and it gets even worse in Season 5, where he [[spoiler:flat-out admits that he's continuing to cook meth in order to build an empire. He even tells Jesse that "this business is all I have left," despite the fact that the reason he's lost most of what he had at that point was due to his desire to continue cooking]]. Mike even calls him out on this [[spoiler:after Gus's death and the death of his drug empire, saying "he just had to be the man"]]. In the finale, Walt finally admits to Skyler that [[spoiler:cooking meth was something he did for himself, and his family was always just an excuse]]. This marks probably one of the very few times the admission of this trope has been portrayed in a sympathetic light, as he is finally being honest with himself and his wife.

* ''Series/BreakingBad'': Walter White. Originally [[JustifiedCriminal having turned to cooking crystal meth to pay his hospital bills and provide some extra money for his family should he die]], his motivations increasingly turn to serving his own ego and hunger for power. He even says this word-for-word in the Season 4 episode "Cornered," and it gets even worse in Season 5, where he [[spoiler:flat-out admits that he's continuing to cook meth in order to build an empire. He even tells Jesse that "this business is all I have left," despite the fact that the reason he's lost most of what he had at that point was due to his desire to continue cooking]]. In the finale, Walt finally admits to Skyler that [[spoiler:cooking meth was something he did for himself, and his family was always just an excuse]]. This marks probably one of the very few times the admission of this trope has been portrayed in a sympathetic light, as he is finally being honest with himself and his wife.

** The Season 7 finale manages to take this UpToEleven. The Tanner household is more crowded than ever -- D.J. and Stephanie are both teenagers now (and Stephanie is still sharing her room with her much younger sister), while Becky has given birth to twin boys (which means there's now a family of four living in a renovated attic). An extremely wealthy man shows up and explains that he grew up in the house, and is ready to buy it for a huge sum. Danny calls a family meeting to discuss the idea, and everyone begins to excitedly plan (and not just on luxuries -- Joey hopes to get his own personal life settled, while Becky and Jesse are looking forward to creating a private space to call home). Everyone, that is, except Michelle, who decides (for the ''whole family'') that they have to be together no matter what. It's clear that the group will find homes relatively close to each other (Danny and Becky are coworkers, for example) and will still spend a good deal of time together. But that doesn't matter to Michelle: they have to live in the same house to be a "family." And ''everyone agrees to this.'' Is it anyone wonder the fans (and even some of the actors on the show) have come to hate her so much?

* ''Series/GossipGirl'': Blair Waldorf was always this from the word go, but in Season 5 she turned it UpToEleven -- which is one of the reasons why she went from fan favorite to a character most people dislike.

** Rachel suffers badly from this because of her doting parents. It was well-managed in earlier seasons when she was ''aware'' of how spoiled she was, trying to improve, and balanced with a scared naivete. However in later seasons, she becomes more confident and arrogant showing little regard for anyone else's problems.
** Special examples are trying to crash Ross's wedding even though she'd rejected him barely a season before, stealing Monica and Chandler's engagement night because they were happy and she wasn't, and later forcing them to come to her baby's birthday party even though they'd recently discovered [[spoiler: they couldn't have children]] and ''wanted to take a weekend away to deal with it''.
** On the other hand, "stealing Monica and Chandler's engagement night" is entirely the view of Monica, who can have elements of this herself (for the opposite reason, she was the UnFavorite as a child), including her response to Rachel saying her pregnancy isn't as big a deal as Monica's wedding "Of course not, nothing is!"; ''literally saying'' the wedding is all about her, and being baffled when Chandler asks if it's maybe a little about him; and her reaction to the big Rachel and Ross break-up:

* On ''Series/FullHouse'', all three of the Tanner girls occasionally acted this way, but the biggest culprit by far was CreatorsPet Michelle. Two examples in particular stand out:
** After Uncle Jesse marries Rebecca Donaldson, they naturally plan to move in together to start their new life. But Michelle is too upset by the idea of Uncle Jesse leaving the house (to live in an apartment ''explicitly stated'' to be a ten-minute walk away) to stand this, and guilts Jesse into feeling the same way (he was eager to move out before Michelle started complaining). Ultimately, Michelle gets her way, and Jesse and Rebecca remodel the house's attic to become a private apartment -- and even then, Michelle is prone to barging in and demanding attention.

** Felicity [[TookALevelInJerkass gradually becomes like this]] over the course of the third season, before hitting this attitude full-force in Season 4. When Oliver [[spoiler:learns that he has a long-lost illegitimate son]] she accuses him of being untrustworthy (even though he just learned about it a day prior), only thinking of himself and not caring about what she feels, ignoring what he's going through over this knowledge, and breaks up with him over it. And she gets upset with him going behind her back, [[{{Hypocrite}} even though she was doing the same thing]] at the beginning of the season when she was still assisting Team Arrow without his knowledge. It was these events that lead to her turning from an EnsembleDarkhorse into TheScrappy.

*** She regards Jaime as a poor sight at the start of Season 4 and complains about being left alone to suffer a siege in the capital despite being surrounded by servants and with several bodyguards while living lavishly in the Red Keep which she considers far worse than Jaime's imprisonment, maiming, and being humiliated and despised.
*** Her main reason for accusing Tyrion for Joffrey's murder amounts to her believing that Joffrey's assassination was motivated solely to hurt ''her'' personally. It doesn't matter that Tyrion might have had much more legitimate motives for killing Joffrey; to Cersei, the motive ''must'' have been that he wanted to get back at her specifically and Joffrey just happened to be collateral damage.

*** In "The Children", she tells Tywin that she'd be willing to burn House Lannister to the ground so long as she remains Queen and gets to have her children. In the Season 6 finale, we see this wasn't an idle threat when she literally burns down a good chunk of the city's skyline to take out the Faith Militant, Margaery, and everyone else that opposes her to make sure she stays in power.

** Tyrion calls Tywin out on this, noting that Tywin automatically equates his personal ambitions with that of his family and that he makes his children compromise and face consequences that he himself has never done and will never do. Tywin's reply to that was that the great personal sacrifice he made was not killing Tyrion as a baby. Likewise, Tywin ''could'' have resolved the seeming unfittingness of his children by naming his brother Kevan as heir but then Tywin couldn't well claim that it was ''his'' great family line. Also, Kevan himself has a SketchySuccessor in the soon to become Brother Lancel.

* ''Series/ControlZ'': Natalia has a twisted philosophy in achieving her goals, which is proved when her sister María questions her about the stolen money collected for the school's NONA party, which she had spent buying expensive bags for herself. Ironically, Natalia herself ''isn't'' wealthy like her popular friends because, according to Sofía, she is only with them because they give her "status".

** The Cat actually makes a logical argument that the world revolves around him. It finishes with ''The most exciting things that have ever happened to me, have been whenever I was in the room!'' This is apparently [[CatsAreMean the default attitude of his species]].

** In the [[AudioPlay/BigFinishDoctorWho audio spin-off]] "The Lady in the Lake", the character of Lake learned that he had the ability to regenerate after death as he was one of various 'proto-Time Lords' cloned from [[Characters/DoctorWhoRiverSong River Song]]. He became completely obsessed with learning how many lives he might have before he would die for good, to the extent that he manipulated his fellow clones into giving up their lives so that he could see how long it took for them to die, but this 'plan' [[AllForNothing proved pointless]] as the proto-Time Lords all had a different number of regenerations, ranging from two to nine, so Lake couldn't be sure how many he would have himself (he is shown regenerating at least four times).

* ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'': Obsessive collector Kivas Fajo in the episode "The Most Toys". In order to expand his collection, he abducts and fakes the death of a Federation officer (specifically, Data), then tries to force Data to comply with his whims by threatening to murder his own subordinates, at one point killing his assistant of 14 years, then dismissing her death with "there's always another Varria". [[spoiler:Had O'Brien been just one second slower with the transporter, Data would have inflicted an agonizing IronicDeath on him with the same model of disruptor he'd used on Varria. Nobody in or out of universe would have put much effort into mourning him.]]

* ''Series/AtLastThe1948Show'': This was the main joke of "The Lovely" [=Aimi MacDonald=], who instead of doing transitions between the sketches (her supposed role on the show) would talk about how lovely she was, try to raise money for the "Make [=Aimi MacDonald=] A Rich Woman Fund," and just generally try to draw all attention to herself.

* ''Series/NoahsArc'': Noah seems to fall into this regarding relationships, and occasionally catches himself (or is called out on) not really giving as much focus to his friends' relationship issues while they are expected to drop whatever they are doing to tend to his. Its highlighted at the end of one episode where Ricky just went through a breakup and is clearly depressed, and Noah calls him to complain about the "emergency" of Wade wanting to go house hunting with him.

'''Holmes:''': What life? I've been away.

* ''Series/MotherlandFortSalem'': : At first she's quite selfish. [[CharacterDevelopment Over time however]] she starts to genuinely care for and look out for the members of her team, who became her friends.

%% This page has been alphabetized. Please add new examples in the correct order.

** The Doctor's EvilCounterpart, the Master. While the Doctor has used up several [[TheNthDoctor regenerations]] saving their companions, the Master has a history of throwing others under the bus to save themself — or just ForTheEvulz; spin-off media has shown the Master manipulating an entire planet into civil war just to create the necessary technological development to repair his TARDIS, and on another occasion one of the Master's incarnations was willing to kill ''his own past self'' as part of a wider plan. In [[Recap/DoctorWhoS30E17E18TheEndOfTime "The End of Time"]], the Simm Master assumes the ominous prophecy the Doctor's heard is all about him, unaware he's actually Rassilon's errand boy.

** "[[Recap/DoctorWhoS27E11BoomTown Boom Town]]": Blon Fel-Fotch Passameer-Day Slitheen, aka Margaret Blaine, tells the Doctor that, on one occasion, she could have murdered someone to benefit herself, but didn't. The Doctor points out that there are a lot more people that she has murdered — including the woman whose skin she's currently wearing.

** After Uncle Jesse marries Rebecca Donaldson, they naturally plan to move in together to start their new life. But Michelle is too upset by the idea of Uncle Jesse leaving the house (to live in an apartment ''explicitly stated'' to be a ten-minute walk away) to stand this, and guilts Jesse into feeling the same way (he was eager to move out before Michelle started complaining). Ultimately, Michelle gets her way, and Jesse and Rebecca remodel the house's attic to become a private apartment--and even then, Michelle is prone to barging in and demanding attention.
** The Season 7 finale manages to take this UpToEleven. The Tanner household is more crowded than ever--D.J. and Stephanie are both teenagers now (and Stephanie is still sharing her room with her much younger sister), while Becky has given birth to twin boys (which means there's now a family of four living in a renovated attic). An extremely wealthy man shows up and explains that he grew up in the house, and is ready to buy it for a huge sum. Danny calls a family meeting to discuss the idea, and everyone begins to excitedly plan (and not just on luxuries--Joey hopes to get his own personal life settled, while Becky and Jesse are looking forward to creating a private space to call home). Everyone, that is, except Michelle, who decides (for the ''whole family'') that they have to be together no matter what. It's clear that the group will find homes relatively close to each other (Danny and Becky are coworkers, for example) and will still spend a good deal of time together. But that doesn't matter to Michelle: they have to live in the same house to be a "family." And ''everyone agrees to this.'' Is it anyone wonder the fans (and even some of the actors on the show) have come to hate her so much?

** Cersei, to the point of possible textbook narcissim:

** Renly Baratheon, though charming and sincere about the well-being of the common people, is self-centered enough to declare himself king just because he thinks he'd be good at it, even though he has few tangible accomplishments and much less experience compared to Stannis, making his claim Stannis should be passed over for rule rather shaky, and Renly knows it will very likely mean killing his own brother. He claims that he would be a superior monarch in comparison to Stannis because the older man has NoSocialSkills, completely ignoring — unlike Ned — his impeccable service record.

** Sue Sylvester ...everything she says and does, really. However, she at least has a MoralityPet in the name of a older sister with Down's syndrome who she dearly, genuinely loves--[[spoiler: just look at what happens when she dies.]] As such, Sue treats Becky, a teen with Down's syndrome and her own personal henchwoman, with respect as well, even making her the cheerleading captain.

* This was one of Blanche's key traits on ''Series/TheGoldenGirls'', in addition to her [[ReallyGetsAround legendary promiscuity]] and obsession with seeming young. On several occasions, she would take a totally unrelated situation, such as the girls being taken hostage by a robber, and somehow make herself the center of attention (in that case, she pointed out that the youngest and the prettiest--i.e., herself--was always the first person to be attacked).

* ''Series/GossipGirl'': Blair Waldorf was always this from the word go, but in Season 5 she turned it UpToEleven - which is one of the reasons why she went from fan favorite to a character most people dislike.

* ''Series/{{Monk}}'': It's been said that Adrian Monk has to make an issue personal in order to exert more self-control over his world. In one episode Sharona, his first caretaker, confesses to Monk that she is afraid of elephants (a fear with a [[FreudianExcuse legitimate history]]--as a child, she saw another little girl fall into an elephant pit and nearly ''die''). Monk, who himself is full of phobias, dismissively tells her to "suck it up." She spends a good part of the rest of the episode furious at his callousness, and he can't figure out why she's mad at him, even when she throws his own words back in his face, until she spells it out for him.

* ''Series/{{Reba}}'': Barbara Jean is blind to her own flaws in general, and therefore expects that everyone--especially Reba-- will like her. Reba's husband has had an affair with Barbara Jean and then divorced Reba to marry Barbara Jean. And Barbara Jean's insensitivity extends to a failure to understand that this is a reason why Reba might not be too comfortable being best friends with the woman who stole her husband.

* Becky on ''Series/{{Roseanne}}'' has her moments. For example, when Dan reveals that his bike shop is going out of business, instead of feeling sorry for her father, Becky gets upset that he won't have enough money to get her into college (although [[JerkassHasAPoint she did raise a good point]] when she argued that he essentially gambled the entire family's savings--including her education fund--to run a business which he knew next to nothing about from an economic standpoint).

* ''Series/SeaChange'': Although not a villain - this show doesn't really have any villains - Jules Jelly, the daughter of town JerkAss Bob Jelly, is probably the paramount example. The worst example is in the episode "Balls and Friggin' Good Luck", where a young man she dated for a while, Jerome, committed suicide. Jules constantly exaggerates and grand-stands to make everything about her while showing absolutely no sorrow at Jerome's death. Even worse is when at the inquest, she tries to act like everything's about her, while Jerome's family are there, crying their eyes out. It gets so bad that her own mother tells her to stop it.

* ''Series/{{Sherlock}}'': This trope is a staple of any good portrayal of Franchise/SherlockHolmes, but [[Film/SherlockHolmes2009 recent]] [[Series/{{Sherlock}} incarnations]] of the character seem bound-and-determined to raise it to new levels entirely. In the series three premier, Holmes returns to England after a two year absence, during which the public--including Dr. John Watson--[[spoiler:believed Holmes to be dead]]:

** Russell from ''Samoa'' and ''Heroes Vs Villains'' seemed to believe that he was such a good player and his strategy- which involved voting off members of his own alliance, constantly backstabbing people and lying to everyone- was so good that the jury would just automatically vote for him, even though he got most of them voted off in the first place. In the end, out of the eighteen votes he could have got from both juries, he got ''two''. And both of those were from the ''Samoa'' jury. Jeff tried to tell him that maybe if he hadn't lied to the jury, back-stabbed them and generally treated them like shit, he might have got some votes… and he ''still'' couldn't understand, refusing to acknowledge the idea of the social game. At one point he even said that America should be able to vote, [[SoreLoser he was that frustrated.]]

* ''Series/{{Tinsel}}'': [[SmugSnake Kwame]]. He is shocked that Angela would break into his office and steal back her medical files - the same medical files that he's been blackmailing her with and that he stole from her doctor's office in the first place!

* On ''Series/{{Westworld}}'', William spends the majority of season 2 thinking the entire host uprising is nothing but an elaborate game played by rival Ford to strike at him personally rather than them actually gaining independence. He even shoots a would-be rescue team, thinking it's part of the trap. Lampshaded by his daughter Emily snapping how "you think ''all'' this is for ''you''." Becomes tragic when [[spoiler:he guns down Emily only to realize she actually was his daughter, leading to a breakdown.]]

* Series/BlackAdder: All incarnations of Edmund Blackadder share one trait, namely "... the belief, raised almost to the point of religiosity, that [their] hide is more valuable than anyone else's."

* On ''Series/{{Westworld}}'', William spends the majority of season 2 thinking the entire host uprising is nothing but an elaborate game played by rival Ford to strike at him personally rather than them actually gaining independence. He even shoots a would-be rescue team, thinking it's part of the trap. Lampshaded by daughter Emily snapping on how "you think ''all'' this is for ''you''." Becomes tragic when [[spoiler:he guns down Emily only to realize she actually was his daughter, leading to a breakdown.]]

* ''Series/MotherlandFortSalem'': Raelle and Abigail. They often butt heads due to both of them being very stubborn.

* ''Series/{{Monk}}'': It's been said that Adrian Monk has to make an issue personal in order to exert more self-control over his world.
** In one episode Sharona, his first caretaker, confesses to Monk that she is afraid of elephants (a fear with a [[FreudianExcuse legitimate history]]--as a child, she saw another little girl fall into an elephant pit and nearly ''die''). Monk, who himself is full of phobias, dismissively tells her to "suck it up." She spends a good part of the rest of the episode furious at his callousness, and he can't figure out why she's mad at him, even when she throws his own words back in his face, until she spells it out for him.