History Main / TheMillstone

** Gettig a bear to attack the shark, but they end up being partners-in-crime.

* ''Film/PulpFiction'': Vincent Vega makes things worse for himself and everyone around him because of his [[WhatAnIdiot profound stupidity]]. [[spoiler:[[IJustShotMarvinInTheFace Shooting Marvin in the face]] due to not watching where he was pointing his gun]] turned a simple {{escort mission}} into a long saga of grief and stress for Vincent and Jules. Vincent's stupidity proves to be his undoing when he uses the bathroom in Butch's apartment, leaving his gun outside the bathroom for Butch to find and use on Vincent. To make this extra brainless, the only reason Vincent was alone was because Marcellus had just stepped out to get doughnuts. He'd probably have survived if he'd waited an additional five minutes to use the toilet.]]]]

* ''Film/PulpFiction'': Vincent Vega makes things worse for himself and everyone around him because of his [[WhatAnIdiot profound stupidity]]. [[spoiler:[[IJustShotMarvinInTheFace Shooting Marvin in the face]] due to not watching where he was pointing his gun]] turned a simple {{escort mission}} into a long saga of grief and stress for Vincent and Jules. Vincent's stupidity proves to be his undoing when he uses the bathroom in Butch's apartment, leaving his gun outside the bathroom for Butch to find and use on Vincent. To make this extra brainless, the only reason Vincent was alone was because Marcellus had just stepped out to get doughnuts. He'd probably have survived if he'd waited an additional five minutes to use the toilet.]]

* ''Film/PulpFiction'': Vincent Vega manages to make things infinitely worse for himself and everyone around him in almost every situation because of his [[WhatAnIdiot profound stupidity]]. Him [[spoiler:[[IJustShotMarvinInTheFace shooting Marvin]] due to not watching where the fuck he was pointing his gun]] turned a simple mission into a long saga of grief and stress for him and Jules. His stupidity ultimately proves to be his undoing when he takes a shit in Butch's old apartment and leaves his gun outside the bathroom for Butch to find and use on him. To make this extra brainless, the only reason Vincent was alone in the apartment was because his boss had just stepped out to get doughnuts. He'd probably have survived if he'd just waited an additional five minutes to use the toilet, instead of knowingly putting himself in the most vulnerable position possible.
* The casual viewer may not notice at first because he's the closest to a "main" protagonist, but every major problem the team faces in ''Film/{{Ghostbusters 1984}}'' is caused by Dr. Peter Venkman. The Dean at Columbia U specifically cites his smarmy attitude and freewheeling approach to the scientific method as the reasons for kicking the team off campus, his overly-forward attempts to hit on Dana almost cost them their first customer, and his antagonizing of EPA agent Walter Peck backfires horribly when Peck turns out to be a petty tyrant who orders their containment grid shut down, freeing hundreds of trapped ghosts and speeding along the BigBad's plan. Despite this, Venkman can be considered a subversion of the usual Millstone, since it's his cleverness, resourcefulness, and silver tongue that always end up fixing the problems he causes.

* ''ComicBook/SonicTheHedgehogArchieComics'': Silver, to an extent. In his efforts to SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong by tracking down and stopping a traitor in the Freedom Fighters, he has repeatedly [[InspectorJavert jumped to conclusions]] and accused Rotor, Antoine, and Sonic himself of being said traitor, every time with very little to go on. He later began to suspect Bunnie of being the traitor based on the information that she had left without telling anyone, but Sonic, who was already about to strangle him for accusing Antoine, finally blew a fuse and dished out a TheReasonYouSuckSpeech to Silver, telling him that there ''was'' no traitor and that his friends were all better heroes than a "flake" like Silver could ever hope to be before finally ordering him to just pack up and go home because all he's doing is screwing things up; upon discovering that Silver is currently TrappedInThePast, Sonic just flat-out tells him to GetOut.
** Silver did turn out to be right about a traitor of sorts being present... [[spoiler:it's Sally Acorn, who had been Roboticized (prior to the universe reset). Naturally, since Sonic still frothed at the mouth at the sight of him, he had trouble explaining this.]]

** The RunningGag of Charlie Brown losing baseball game after baseball game is possible only because his team doesn't know better. Even a [[PutMeInCoach 51-50 loss]] never stopped him from pitching. (Indeed, there's a sub-RunningGag that the team wins when Charlie Brown is at camp or some such.)

* In ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyEquestriaGirlsFriendshipGames'', Twilight Sparkle excels in the academic portion of the titular Games, but is completely useless in the athletic portion. She [[FaceFault faceplants after trying to do a simple jump]], takes ages to swing on a rope across a small pit, and misses every shot with her arrows in archery. It takes one of Twilight's rivals from the other team giving her advice before she finally hits the archery target, and by then, Twilight's team is hopelessly behind.

** The plot of [[Film/HaroldAndKumarEscapeFromGuantanamoBay the sequel]] is kicked off when Kumar tries to smoke some weed on an airplane that is heading for Amsterdam. As Harold points out, all Kumar had to do was wait a few hours.

* ''Film/TheBigLebowski'': Walter Sobchak is a cross between this and a total [[{{Jerkass}} asshole]]. Everything goes completely wrong for the Dude the moment he opens his mouth or comes up with a plan. The kicker? [[spoiler:Walter was right all along.]]

* Peregrin Took in ''Film/TheLordOfTheRingsTheFellowshipOfTheRing'', where he's responsible for, among other things: drunkenly revealing Frodo's identity to everybody within earshot, starting a fire at Weathertop that attracts the Ringwraiths, waking up The Watcher which forces the Fellowship to flee into Moria, and finally waking up everything ''in'' Moria when they're knee-deep in it. He does eventually [[TookALevelInBadass grow out of it]], though.
-->'''Gandalf:''' ''Fool of a Took!'' Throw yourself down next time and rid of your stupidity!

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSpectacularSpiderMan'': Electro is this for the villains. Every time Doc Ock plans out a clever scheme, Electro is responsible for it falling apart. He's so insane and readily prone to rage that invariably, Spider-Man will piss him off and he'll start recklessly throwing lightning bolts around and will destroy whatever phlebotinum Doc Ock was relying on.

** In ''WesternAnimation/SouthParkPostCovid'', Clyde becomes a StrawmanPolitical for [[UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic COVID]] vaccine skeptics and single-handedly causes the town to be placed under martial law over his refusal to even consider getting the vaccine or lie about having it. [[spoiler: This leads to him becoming an UnwittingPawn in Cartman's scheme to sabotage the others and protect his family from their attempt to SetRightWhatOnceWentWrong.]]

** In ''WesternAnimation/SouthParkPostCovid'', Clyde becomes a StrawmanPolitical for [[UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic COVID]] vaccine skeptics and single-handedly causes the town to be placed under martial law over his refusal to even consider getting the vaccine. When the others attempt to visit [[spoiler: Butters]] in the BedlamHouse while investigating [[RunningGag Kenny's death]], they're turned away over it which he neglects to mention when he could have simply stayed behind and let the others go ahead.

** In ''WesternAnimation/SouthParkPostCovid'', Clyde becomes a StrawmanPolitical for [[UsefulNotes/COVID19Pandemic COVID]] vaccine skeptics and single-handedly causes the town to be placed under martial law over his refusal to even consider getting the vaccine. When the others attempt to visit [[spoiler: Butters]] in the BedlamHouse while investigating [[RunningGag Kenny's death]], they're turned away over it which he neglects to mention.

* ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'': In the Hurricane episode, Stan repeatedly makes things worse for his family during the titular event. Which include but aren't limited to:

** Open a window to get to higher ground which causes a shark within the flood to come into the house and nearly eat Hayley alive.

** The real Millstone of the Order is certainly Belkar. His sociopathy and frequent refusal to listen to orders ruin the party's planning several times -- for example, leaving the spellcasters undefended to kill goblins, setting the bandit camp on fire because he couldn't wait, or killing the Oracle. If it weren't for Belkar, would Miko have reported an imminent hobgoblin invasion in time to prevent it, or would she still have slain the leader while he was conspiring with the apparent allies of those invaders? If he hadn't pursued Miko to torment her over his childish grudge, would Azure City not have fallen and Soon's Gate remain intact? After a VisionQuest, fake character development, and then some real CharacterDevelopment, he seems to be growing out of it.

* [[OurElvesAreDifferent King Aspen and his deer]] from ''ComicBook/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagicIDW''. They never stop to realize that, had they ''not'' decided to [[RevengeBeforeReason attack all of Equestria]], leaving Princess Celestia and Princess Luna (literally) too tied up to come and help, that the entire conflict of the comic would have been settled in time for lunch in about four pages.

** Pam is a total loud mouth who shouts out everyones secrets, and tells criminals about what they're doing, and where they are. Cheryl is even worse, being directly responsible for [[spoiler:the death of Nikolai Jakov]].

* Claptrap from the ''VideoGame/{{Borderlands}}'' series. His complete inability to do anything right most of the time greatly annoys both the characters and players alike. Taken UpToEleven in the Claptastic Voyage DLC for ''VideoGame/BorderlandsThePreSequel'', where it reveals his most disastrous accident to date. It's even made into a gameplay mechanic, wherein his ability may cause the other Vault Hunters to start randomly jumping or otherwise lose control.

* Although he does prove useful now and again, one could wonder ''why'' Zim of ''WesternAnimation/InvaderZim'' keeps giving [[CloudCuckoolander GIR]] crucial roles in his world-conquering plans. Though, when it's not GIR that's the problem it's usually Zim foiling ''his own'' plans- to the point that when he turned GIR competent, he was forced to revert it because GIR tried to kill him for being his own biggest obstacle.
** Invader Zim being the Millstone on his home planet is actually what sets off the whole plot; his leaders send him into deep space (unwittingly, to Earth) simply to get him out of their antennae. He's such a Millstone to the planet [[MeaningfulName Irk]] that his introduction has the population ''literally'' groaning in horror at his arrival. His tendency to singlehandedly foil entire military ventures is [[UpToEleven so extreme]] that the Armada thanks him every time they succeed at something -- for "being so far away" while they did it.

* ''Any'' EscortMission where a TooDumbToLive escortee jumps in your line of fire, walks instead of running (or runs so fast you can't catch up with them), or even attacks every enemy in sight to guarantee mission failure.

** Averted in ''[[ADayInTheLimeLight Sonic Universe]]''. In ''Mobius: 30 Years Later'', his intervention in [[AlternateTimeline Light Mobius]] saved Sonic and Sally from being killed and helped stop [[EldritchAbomination Tikhaos]], but despite hints that [[BadFuture his future]] was the future of Light Mobius during Tikhaos' rampage, his actions had no effect on the timeline, so he fell back to his plan to find a traitor in the Freedom Fighters. In ''The Silver Saga'' story, he manages to save [[BadFuture Dark Mobius]] from its [[PhysicalGod Enerjak]], resolving a BadFuture that had been briefly touched years earlier and not mentioned up until this point.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/WackyRaces'', it is Dick Dastardly (and his {{Expy}}, [[JekyllAndHyde the Phantom Phink]] from ''WesternAnimation/YogisSpaceRace'') who is Millstone; if he had simply driven on without [[DickDastardlyStopsToCheat attempting to cheat]], he could've easily won all his races.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' episode "Crippled Summer", Mimsy is the villainous version of this trope. He screws up all of Nathan's plans, mostly by interpreting the instructions too literally.

* ''Series/{{Community}}'' has Pierce, particularly in Season 2. He discovers Jeff and Troy's "secret trampoline" and manages to expose it in a matter of minutes, getting it removed from campus, and [[LaserGuidedKarma breaking both his legs in the process]]. His ego leads him to go off-script during an anti-drug PSA, [[HarmfulToMinors getting a room full of middle-schoolers excited for drugs]] (until [[TheMentallyDisturbed Chang]] fixes it simply by taking his place). The rest of the main cast is occasionally GenreSavvy about this, not inviting him to a TabletopGame/DungeonsAndDragons game / suicide intervention due to his insensitive manner (and they are proven right when he crashes the game and nearly short-circuits the whole thing). During one of the paintball episodes, Jeff exploits this in order to use Pierce as a decoy:

* Uni in ''WesternAnimation/DungeonsAndDragons''. It's sometimes so blatantly obvious that she is the only reason for the heroes' [[FailureIsTheOnlyOption inability to go back home]] that [[EpilepticTrees some crazy theories]] about the [[MissingEpisode missing last episode]] depict her as being an evil servant of [[{{Satan}} the Devil himself]].

* In ''Series/DrakeAndJosh'', the episodes sometimes play out with the formula of Josh having to suffer because of some scheme of Drake's, and Josh is treated as the ButtMonkey because of it. However, the later season episode "Josh Is Done" deconstructed this trope by demonstrating how much of TheMillstone Drake really is. Josh is finally pushed past his limit and states that he is "done" with Drake as a brother and firmly cuts him out of his life. Drake isn't too bothered by this initially because he thinks Josh needs him, but as the episode goes on, things in life proceed to improve for Josh while they deteriorate for Drake. Josh's relationship with his boss improves, a stress rash he's had for years suddenly goes away, he starts doing better in school, and has more time for friends and dating. Drake turns into a basket case who is unable to function because it turns out he relied on Josh for a lot of basic necessities in his life, is unable to focus on his music, and starts getting acne. It all culminates in Drake getting humiliated in chemistry class so badly he ends up running out, but not before apologizing to Josh for everything and for being a bad brother, and admitting he needs Josh way more than Josh needs him. Josh accepts Drake back after his apology.

** The absolute and undisputed star of the Millstones, however, is a BigFancyCastle rather than a person: [[AwesomeButImpractical Harrenhal]]. Ever since its fall to the Targaryens, it is reputed to curse the person who commands it and any family that holds it for long. While there appears to be something to this, even if this is just legend, the reputation is enough for cautious men to hand it off as soon as they possibly can. Additionally, being in a fairly strategic location means others will try to bring the current commander to ruin in wartime, so there's that, too. Almost ''every'' family and military commander given the castle has gone -- often in remarkably over-the-top, horrific ways, even by Westerosi standards. Those that haven't completely died out have become, at best, poor, divested, bit-part players in the Game as a direct result of [[RealityEnsues trying to run the best-used-as-a-quarry-of-ready-dressed-stonework as a going concern]].

* The second season of ''Anime/{{Shirobako}}'' introduces one in the form of Shinsuke Chazawa, the editor for the InUniverse ''Third Aerial Girls' Squad'' manga that the main characters are trying to adapt to an anime. Given the lengths he goes to hinder [=MusuAni=] in producing the series, up to [[spoiler: deliberately doing everything he can to prevent the director from communicating with the manga's author]], it'd be understandable for a viewer to think that he was deliberately being paid to sabotage production (he's not; he's just resentful of anything that gets in the way of his leisure time). A conservative estimate would be that at least half of all the problems in the second season are his fault.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'' episode that parodies ''Literature/LordOfTheFlies'', Milhouse. Pretty much every bad thing that happens after they get stranded on the island happens because of Milhouse.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSpectacularSpiderMan'': Electro is this for the villains. Every time Doc Ock plans out a clever scheme, Electro is responsible for it falling apart. He's so insane and readily prone to rage that invariably, Spider-Man will piss him off and he'll start recklessly throwing lightning bolts around and will destroy whatever phlebotinium Doc Ock was relying on.
* ''WesternAnimation/{{SpongeBob SquarePants}}''
** Patrick fits more than the usual. Whenever [=SpongeBob=] or anyone has a plan, Patrick is sure to screw it up, or do something stupid to make it worse. UpToEleven [[SeasonalRot post-movie]].

** And then, every once in a great while, the Eds will do something right without any one of them screwing it up. In those cases, one of the other kids screws it up. Most commonly [[{{Jerkass}} Kevin]], [[SpoiledBrat Sarah]], or [[AbhorrentAdmirer the Kanker Sisters]], but [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} Johnny]] and [[FunnyForeigner Rolf]] do it a lot, too.
* ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddparents'': Timmy tends to be this, to himself. A lot of the wishes he makes that go wrong are actually pretty decent wishes, but usually it's something he does in stupidity that brings out the bad sides of the wishes and sets up the plot of the episode. This is occasionally {{lampshade|Hanging}}d, as some episodes feature Wanda confronting Timmy about his thoughtless, reckless, fundamentally flawed wishes.

** Silver did turn out to be right about a traitor of sorts being present... [[spoiler:it's Sally Acorn, who has become Roboticized (prior to the universe reset). Naturally, since Sonic still frothed at the mouth at the sight of him, he had trouble explaining this.]]
** Averted the ''[[ADayInTheLimeLight Sonic Universe]]''. In ''Mobius: 30 Years Later'', his intervention in [[AlternateTimeline Light Mobius]] and saved Sonic and Sally from being killed and helped stop [[EldritchAbomination Tikhaos]], but despite hints that [[BadFuture his future]] was the future of Light Mobius during Tikhaos' rampage, his actions had no effect on his future, so he fell back to his plan to find a traitor in the Freedom Fighters. In story, ''The Silver Saga'', he manages to save [[BadFuture Dark Mobius]] from its [[PhysicalGod Enerjak]], resolving a BadFuture that had been briefly touched years earlier and not mentioned till this point.