History WellIntentionedExtremist / WesternAnimation

* The SequelSeries, ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'':
** The [[MugglePower Equalists]], who want [[{{Muggle}} non-benders]] to be treated fairly. It's just that their means to achieve this is by the removal of [[ElementalPowers bending]] from the world.
** Tarrlok, one of the leaders of Republic City, seems to be this as well. He wants to stop the Equalist threat, but he treats all non-benders as Equalists and wants to remove their rights. [[spoiler:Subverted as he's really just trying to gain more power over the city and take it over like his father, Yakone, attempted to do before.]]
** Korra's uncle, [[AmbiguouslyEvil Chief]] [[EvilMentor Unalaq]] of the Northern Water Tribe, with his [[VillainousCheekbones suspect cheekbones]] and [[HolierThanThou religious fervor]], appears poised to be treated as one as well. Though he aims to restore spiritual harmony in his southern sister tribe and by extension the world, he appears willing to [[spoiler:impose an occupational crusade upon them as a means of not-so-subtle coercion to get them back in touch with their spiritual sides]].
*** This interpretation loses some of its credibility in episode 4 when it becomes known that [[spoiler: Unalaq engineered the barbarian raid on the Northern Tribe that led to his brother's banishment. Korra claims he's power-hungry, envious of his brother's position as both the older brother who would have become chief, ''and'' as the father of the Avatar (and Chief in the Southern Tribe). However, there's no evidence that he's not [[JerkassHasAPoint still right]] about the Dark Spirits.]]
*** Eventually, it's established that he does believe in his rhetoric, and wants to bring balance to the world. [[spoiler: Pity he hopes to accomplish this by fusing with the spirit of darkness and chaos...]]
** Zaheer and the rest of the Red Lotus want to bring balance and freedom to the world. [[BombThrowingAnarchist Unfortunately they want to do this by tearing down all of the nation's governments]], [[OrderVersusChaos seeing chaos as the natural state of the world]]. They also believe that, the world's leaders, such as the war-mongering Firelords, the incompetent president of the United Republic, and the tyrannical Earth Queen, [[VillainHasAPoint are the ones who end up doing the most harm to the world.]]
** This is discussed in Season 4 when Toph points out that all the villains Korra's fought had good ideas, and may even have had the best intentions at the start, but just went too far in their execution. This discussion is a major factor in helping Korra snap out of her HeroicBSOD.
** [[GloriousLeader Kuvira]] is completely correct in her initial points. When she stepped in, the Earth Kingdom had collapsed into anarchy, the heir apparent was a [[RoyalBrat bumbling idiot]] and completely unsuited for the position, and the idea of a monarchy is itself an obsolescent relic in a technological age. That said, her solution is to overthrow the Earth Kingdom and declare an Earth Empire in its place, which [[GoodRepublicEvilEmpire we know is a bad thing]], cementing it by forcing her citizens into slave labor ([[OffstageVillainy offscreen]]), [[PuttingOnTheReich jailing dissenters and anyone of non-Earth ethnicity]], and attempting to forcibly conquer every single state that was ever once part of the Earth Kingdom, including [[spoiler:Zaofu and the long-independent United Republic]]. [[spoiler: In the end, [[VillainHasAPoint the Earth King accepts her point about the monarchy and voluntarily abdicates to create a republic.]]]]
* In the final episodes of Season Five of ''WesternAnimation/StarWarsTheCloneWars'', [[spoiler: Barriss Offee]] becomes one by bombing the Jedi Temple, because she believed the Jedi Order was degenerating from peace-keepers into warmongers, and believed they should be punished for it. That doesn't justify a bombing that killed many innocent people, however. Nor does it justify framing Ahsoka to cover your tracks.

* ''WesternAnimation/AdventureTime''
** The Earl of Lemongrab fits this trope. Although he's a mean, sour, bitter, nasty-tempered JerkassWoobie, his intentions are pretty good. All he wants to do during his reign of the Candy Kingdom is live in a place that's quite and clean, free of pranks, trouble-makers, and anybody who bothers him. But he tries to achieve this mild goal through the worst, most extreme methods- screaming constantly and sending everybody in the Candy Kingdom to the dungeon for ONE MILLION YEARS!!!
** Princess Bubblegum fits this trope in the episode "What Have I Done". She wishes to cure the Candy Kingdom of their freezer-burn flu, by making the Ice King howl in pain. When the Ice King refuses, she resorts to making Finn and Jake capture him so she can beat the howls out of him. She later learns that it is not in Finn or Jake's heroic nature to beat people for no reason, and apologizes for forcing them.
*** This becomes a core part of Bubblegum's character as the series goes on. On the one hand, the Candy People are [[HobbesWasRight incapable of taking care of themselves, relying entirely on her autocratic role just to survive]], [[VetinariJobSecurity as is displayed anytime she's not around to babysit them]]. On the other hand, she's willing to go to some pretty scary lengths, including [[FinalSolution multiple counts of genocide]], [[PlayingWithSyringes unethical experimentation]], [[TheNeedsOfTheMany arranging the imprisonment of an (entirely unwitting)]] ApocalypseMaiden [[TheNeedsOfTheMany to make sure she never destroys the world]], [[SurveillanceAsThePlotDemands spying on her subjects and neighbors]] and later risking genocide ''again'' to disable an (already weakened) kingdom's remaining FantasticNuke arsenal. Notably, sometimes [[TheExtremistWasRight she's right]], other times [[KnightTemplar she really isn't]].
** Finn fits this trope a good deal of the time! If you've got a charismatic teenage boy who has super-strength and super-bravery, then odds are he'll probably use more than a few extreme methods during his zealous quest to conquer evil.
** The Ice King. He just wants to have friends and a wife, when you really think about it. All of the awful things he does stem from his desire for companionship.

** In ''WesternAnimation/BeastMachines'', Megatron has a seemingly good idea, in principle. He wants to eliminate political squabbling, which results in nothing ever getting done, by uniting all machines under one mind. Of course, there are problems with this - Megatron is egomaniacal, wanting his mind to be the one in charge, sacrificing the minds of others and destroying those who would stand in his way (the Maximals). Also, he wants a purely technological world, eliminating all organic races (though aside from the Maximals, that already happened on Cybertron).

* Bull Gator from ''WesternAnimation/TazMania'' is this.
* Alvin from the ''WesternAnimation/SabrinaTheAnimatedSeries'' episode "Planet of the Dogs" becomes a mix of this and NobleDemon after Sabrina ignores him.
* ''WesternAnimation/AeonFlux'''s nemesis Trevor Goodchild honestly believes that by walling off his entire country, placing surveillance cameras everywhere, and conducting bizarre experiments in psychology and genetics, he's providing an unobjectionably safe existence for his subjects and gradually improving their quality of life. The frightening thing about this show is that, half the time, you suspect [[VillainHasAPoint he may be]] ''[[VillainHasAPoint right]]''... Aeon herself is generally determined to liberate people from order whether they want it or not and regardless of whether they survive, although there is one occasion when she decides a would-be refugee isn't really suited to live without organization and dumps him right back.
* Examples of this trope often turned up as villains/antagonists on ''WesternAnimation/SuperFriends''.
** Including one villain who thought that it was such a CRIME to spend money on space exploration instead of helping the poor...as opposed to shrinking a whole space center and kidnapping everyone inside?
* WordOfGod claims that this is the way the Brain from ''WesternAnimation/PinkyAndTheBrain'' should be viewed. He wants to rule the world not for the sake of being a dictator, like his rival Snowball, but because he believes that he could do a much better job of it than the people currently in charge. (And Brain has, indeed, done everything in his power to prevent Snowball's evil schemes, knowing that a world under Snowball's rule would be the worst scenario.)
* As seen in "[[WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb Phineas and Ferb’s]] Quantum Boogaloo" , as a result of Candace busting Phineas and Ferb for their rollercoaster, MoralGuardians embark on a misguided crusade for the abolition of creativity in children, ultimately having children be stored in PeopleJars until adulthood. All for the sake of keeping children safe.
* Charlie Dog from ''WesternAnimation/LooneyTunes''. Poor guy, all he wants is to be loved but he goes at it so wrong...
* Ramses the Pharaoh from ''WesternAnimation/ThePrinceOfEgypt''. Rather than making him a cardboard cut-out villain, the creators wrote him as a WellDoneSonGuy with a FreudianExcuse who has a very close relationship with Moses (they grew up together as brothers), who's just doing what he feels is right for the country and his dynasty. His father is the same, and even gives a little speech about how it is necessary to make sacrifices for the greater good (the "sacrifice" being the mass-murder of children). Of course, neither of them feel particularly guilty about ordering the massacre of slaves.
* ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' has a couple.
** Ra's Al Ghul, who ''barely'' manages to scrape into the "well-intentioned" category. His rather vaguely-defined motive is to restore the Earth to its original, "pristine" state. His method is ''wiping out half of humanity''.
** Mister Freeze is introduced as one of the "revenge at any cost" variety, out to avenge himself on the CorruptCorporateExecutive who pulled the plug on the research he hoped to use to save his wife's life and caused the resulting FreakLabAccident that made him what he is. Batman manages to stop him, and also finds evidence of the executive's own crimes to ensure he's brought to justice as well.
* ''WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond'' has Mad Stan, who believes modern society is being crushed by information overload and a corrupt government and that everyone being connected by technology, the internet, and the media is destroying people with more information than they can process. [[StrawmanHasAPoint He might actually have a point]], but the issue is he's a MadBomber who thinks the "only sane way" to solve the problem is to blow everything up starting with the library of all places. He goes on in subsequent appearances to try and blow up Commissioner Gordon for being "part of the corrupt system" and trying to use Zeta to blow up the Department of Health to prevent [[DisproportionateRetribution an increase in pet license taxes]]. He's not a bad guy at heart, even intervening to save Zeta from the government by believing, [[RightForTheWrongReasons correctly so albeit for the wrong reasons]], that Zeta was an innocent man being victimized by the corrupt government, but the HairTriggerTemper, [[TheParanoiac crippling paranoia]], [[BombThrowingAnarchists love of explosions big and small and in-between]], and [[UtopiaJustifiesTheMeans disregard of human life for his "cause"]] make it rather difficult for anyone to get along with him.
* ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'' has the Justice Lords, an AlternateUniverse counterpart of the League who crossed the MoralEventHorizon after [[spoiler:Lord!Superman killed Luthor]]. Their actions in League's mainstream universe added fuel to the paranoia of other {{Well Intentioned Extremist}}s, resulting in the foundation of Project Cadmus specifically to contain the Justice League, led by : [[spoiler:Amanda Waller, Emil Hamilton and Wade Eiling]].
** When it comes to Project Cadmus, they actually come off as a weird inversion of StrawmanHasAPoint: though they genuinely do have a point in that it's reasonable to fear the League going rogue, as several of the League's own members (most notable the {{Badass Normal}}s Franchise/{{Batman}} and ComicBook/GreenArrow) admit, the lengths they go to make them appear far more villainous than the League ever does, with a list of crimes that includes:
*** Taking metahuman children from their homes to rear them as {{Super Soldier}}s.
*** Cloning Comicbook/{{Supergirl}} and rearing her as a living weapon, including dispatching her to murder people on their say-so (Galataea).
*** Creating a mutated, deformed, clone of Superman and abusing him in order to render him a living anti-Superman weapon, then losing control of him (Doomsday).
*** Using a gang of super-criminals to break into the Watchtower's vault and make off with a mystical Weapon of Mass Destruction (The Annihilator).
*** Deliberately striving to discredit and aggravate Superman (Lexo City).
*** Engineering an entire team of genetically engineered "clone" superhumans and then replacing them with fresh clones when they invariably break down and die (the Ultimen)
*** One member, Wade Eiling, [[spoiler: eventually goes so nuts he injects himself with SuperSerum and outright attacks the [=Justice League=] in an effort to "prove" they are a threat.]]
*** Amanda Waller, meanwhile, [[spoiler: eventually defects from Cadmus, but comes to admire Batman so much that she decides that his genes must continue, even if he himself seems determined to drive away every single potential love interest with his obsessive fixation on "the duty". She does this by genetically modifying an unknowing couple so the man's sperm is genetically Bruce Wayne's -- something that's subtly implied causes their eventual divorce -- and then trying to get an assassin to murder the parents of the resultant sons in the belief that the traumatic murder-by-criminals of both parents is an essential "ingredient" in the recipe for Batman. However, said assassin also happened to be Bruce's former love interest [[WesternAnimation/BatmanMaskOfThePhantasm Andrea Beaumont]], who is ultimately unable to go through with it because it would be going against everything Bruce ever stood for. Realizing she crossed a line, she abandoned the project, but as fate would have it, [[WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond Terry McGinnis]], the end result of her project, would go on to meet Bruce on his own, and lose his father to Derek Powers by chance, thus ensuring that the project was a success. Waller even admits to Terry that she knows she has a lot of sins to answer for with God when her time finally comes.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/TheAvengersEarthsMightiestHeroes'' has Kang the Conqueror. The future where he comes from is being erased from existence, so he goes to the past to fix this. He decided that the best way to do this is to conquer the past to prepare the people of Earth for the coming AlienInvasion. And to add to that, he thinks that the future destruction is caused by [[spoiler:Captain America]]. His solution? [[spoiler:To kill Captain America in order to save his future. Too bad he went after the wrong one]].
* ''Dante's Inferno: An Animated Epic'': Dante, before and during his time in the crusades. His unquestioning loyalty in his religious mission causes him to justify the beating of a prisoner for protecting a woman by claiming that he deserved what he got for being a heretic. He also uses his status as a soldier of god to gain comfort from the women whom the beaten prisoner was protecting, despite promising his wife that he would remain true to their marriage.
-->'''Soldier:''' "Dante, do not commit this wicked sin!"\\
'''Dante:''' "How is it a sin, if I'm already absolved?"

* In the 1930s MGM cartoon "Jitterbug Follies", Count Screwloose tries to scam the public by selling tickets for a show that won't go on, but a group called "Citizens For Fair Play" tell him to put on a show or else. They happen to to act and dress like 30s-style thugs.
* On ''WesternAnimation/{{Gargoyles}},'' [[WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds Demona]] has undergone so much pain over the centuries due to humans that she basically wants to wipe them out so that gargoyles can inherit the Earth.
** On the other hand, she cannot admit to herself that a large part of the pain she suffers from is her own fault, blaming upon the humans her own mistakes.
* While the villains of ''WesternAnimation/CaptainPlanetAndThePlaneteers'' are strawmen at best, Sly Sludge and Looten Plunder occasionally come off as this. Sly Sludge's plans normally result from carelessness while trying to dispose of waste. It's not a bad goal by any means... he just doesn't know any better.
** Looten Plunder happens to come off as this during the episode "Bitter Waters". He approaches an Indian Reservation barely sustaining themselves with a proposition of setting up a business there. It provides the people of the reservation with paying jobs and money to spend, but causes environmental damage when Selenium starts tainting the water and he starts wasting it. For once, he doesn't get away because this was on an Indian reservation, and at the end of the episode when the people set up wind turbines and grow crops native to the area, admits they didn't need him after all, while working in the fields as punishment.
* Kaia and the Terras in ''{{WesternAnimation/Motorcity}}'', they oppose Kane like Mike Chilton and the Burners, as Kane spilled toxic waste into their home, mutating their environment [[spoiler:and their bodies]], but their plans to oppose Kane involve harming innocent Detroit Deluxe citizens.
* ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'':
** The Mayor becomes one in the episode "Hot Air Buffoon." He wanted to fight crime without relying on the girls all the time, so he rides an air balloon with a boxing glove and starts punching out criminals...then he starts punching out innocent citizens in the process. The girls have no choice but to stop him.
** Shockingly, [[spoiler:Mojo Jojo]] turns out to be one. His hatred of the Girls is unquestionably wrong, but [[spoiler:when it comes to taking over the world, he actually has its best interests at heart -- the moment he takes over, he ends all its major problems. Once he accomplishes this, he's not even hostile toward the Girls anymore... [[VictoryIsBoring until he gets bored]], at least]].
* The Great Computer and his late creator, Doctor Shibas, from the French animated series ''WesternAnimation/IlEtaitUneFois l'Espace'' (''Once Upon a Time... Space''). Their objective is the welfare of all sentients and defense against any and all tyrants and dictators, but already when Shibas was still alive they were willing to use the overwhelming military power of the immense and well-equipped army of robots built on Yama to do so. They come close to [[TheExtremistWasRight be right]], what with the general Pest being a mad dictator that [[TheFederation Omega]] cannot deal with due his enormous military strength. Shibas never considering using military strength until the construction crew he had invited from the nearby DeathWorld of Apis to build a city for their people destroyed one of his labs and factories, [[InsaneTrollLogic because he wasn't out there to help them personally instead of sending capable construction robots to do the job]]. They miss being right, though, due the horrible living conditions they force the human inhabitants of Yama and Apis (descendants of the construction crew and the colonists of Apis) into... And, knowing this, the Great Computer is trying to learn how to be a good ruler.
* Stimpy in ''WesternAnimation/TheRenAndStimpyShow'''s first cartoon acts like this -- he wants Ren to be happy after his last invention, the Stay-Put Socks, pisses off Ren. So he builds the Happy Helmet, which ''forces'' him to be happy!
* The original ''WesternAnimation/{{Superfriends}}'' was full of guys like this, who were trying to save humanity (or thought they were) or one group of people through their actions, without considering the consequences. One example was a scientist who thought shrinking people could solve world hunger. (Since shrunken human ate far less than normal-sized ones, it made sense, right?) Another example was a scientist who altered the Gulf Stream to the point where he could practically control the weather; his intent was to aid his poverty-stricken nation of Glacia with better farmland, even if it crippled the rest of the world, as he was sure nobody else cared about them. (In truth, nobody else had even ''heard'' of them, and simply asking for help could have avoided a lot of problems.) Another was an alien from Venus who was trying to make the environment of Earth more like his planet so his people could colonize it, because industrial pollution had made the temperature on Venus too cold for them to tolerate. (Again, simply asking for help never occurred to them.)
* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'':
** [[spoiler: The Society of The Blind Eye, whose goal is to help people forget about their bad memories, and to keep them happy and ignorant of the supernatural happenings in Gravity Falls. Unfortunately the memory ray slowly destroys the mind of its target with repeated use, and it most likely caused the stupidity of the townsfolk.]]
** [[spoiler: The author, who turns out to be ''Stan's brother'' may have been one, hoping to create a device that benefited mankind, but caused a terrible accident, so bad that [=McGucket=], who was his assistant, created the memory gun just to forget about it]].
** [[spoiler: Stan himself spent thirty years trying to rebuild the portal and bring his brother back. But he committed a lot of crimes, from false identification to theft of toxic waste, to rebuild it. Not to mention lying to his family, and ignoring the warning that activating the device could have triggered TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt]].
* ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'':
** Twilight Sparkle of all characters borders on this, given her tendency to resort to BrainwashingForTheGreaterGood in "Lesson Zero" and "Keep Calm and Flutter On", and otherwise coming up with ''very'' consequential solutions to problems like wanting to ''freeze time'' in ''It's About Time''. In canon she's never gone so far as to cause irrevocable damage, but FanFiction ''loves'' to give her a push [[JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope off the slippery slope]] and turn her into a KnightTemplar or [[AdaptationalVillainy full-fledged villain]].
** Starlight Glimmer wants to spread friendship and equality throughout all of Equestria...by robbing ponies of their special talents. Starlight, however, turned out to be a [[spoiler: {{hypocrite}} because she had her talent all along (though it is possible that [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation she was going to equalize herself for real once she'd done so to everypony in Equestria, and hadn't done so already because she knew that she would lack the drive to complete her goal)]]. This causes all her support to implode and she goes down in history as an evil ruler, undoing any good her methods might have brought.]]
** [[spoiler:The Season 5 finale later reveals that Starlight Glimmer adopted her ideology of friendship through total equality because her childhood friend, Sunburst, left her when she was a filly after receiving his cutie mark. This caused her to blame Cutie Marks for what happened, and to create her equality village, in hopes of creating a society where nopony could boast about being different or being better than others, and on top of all that, nopony would leave anypony else just to follow whatever destiny their Cutie Mark represents, like how Sunburst left Starlight.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'': Unity wants to bring peace to the Universe by turning all life into a single HiveMind without any individuality.
* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'': [[spoiler: After Steven accidentally un-bubbles the gem in Lion's mane, we meet Bismuth, who was one of the original Crystal Gems. In the final act of that same episode, we discover that she was bubbled by Rose Quartz for developing a weapon that could easily shatter a Gem's gemstone instead of just destroying their physical form (as long as the gemstone is intact, [[FromASingleCell their species can regenerate the body in a matter of minutes)]]. Such a tactic, while it would have likely helped win the GreatOffscreenWar with fewer casualties on the Crystal Gem side, was deemed as [[IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim stooping to Homeworld's level]] by Rose. This sentiment is shared by Steven, which leads to Bismuth being bubbled once again and the weapon destroyed.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'': As of Season 2, it's strongly hinted that [[BigBad Hawk Moth]] might be this. He wants the "ultimate power" that comes with possessing both Ladybug and Chat Noir's {{Transformation Trinket}}s not to TakeOverTheWorld, but simply to bring his beloved wife BackFromTheDead, and it's not yet clear whether or not he actually knows that the only way to accomplish such a feat is via BalancingDeathsBooks. This does not, however, make him any more of a sympathetic character, given that TheReveal of his motives came as a package with the reveal of his true identity as [[spoiler:Adrien's father.]]
** Many akumatized villains come off as this as well. They tend to have sympathetic motives (protecting their students, going after a singer who plagiarized their work, throwing a friend a birthday party, etc.) and target [[HateSink Hate Sinks]]; however, the fact that they don't care what they have to do in the process and the fact that they're working with the series' BigBad means they have to be stopped.
* Helena in ''WesternAnimation/NeoYokio'' [[spoiler:blew up the Bachelor Ranking Board in the center of Neo Yokio. She saw the board as part of Neo Yokio's culture of greed and subjugation of the working class.]]
* In ''WesternAnimation/MegaManFullyCharged'', Ice Man is depicted as this in his first appearance, where he tries to be a hero and thinks that the best way for humans and robots to get along is for him to freeze them together.

* Nerissa, the main villain from ''WesternAnimation/{{WITCH}}'', used to be one of the good guys in charge of protecting the universe, but soon realized that the only way to truly protect the universe was to bring it under her rule, so that she could ensure that there would be no war, suffering, or injustice. For the most part, she ensured that no innocent people were harmed in her crusade, aside from {{the hero}}es who opposed her.

** Twilight Sparkle of all characters borders on this, given her tendency to resort to BrainwashingForTheGreaterGood in "Lesson Zero" and "Keep Calm and Flutter On", and otherwise coming up with ''very'' consequential solutions to problems like wanting to ''freeze time'' in ''It's About Time''. In canon she's never gone so far as to cause irrevocable damage, but FanFiction ''loves'' to give her a push [[JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope off the slippery slope]] and turn her into a KnightTemplar or [[RonTheDeathEater full-fledged villain]].

** Shockingly, [[spoiler:Mojo Jojo]] turns out to be one. His hatred of the Girls is unquestionably wrong, but [[spoiler:when it comes to taking over the world, he actually has its best interests at heart -- the moment he takes over, he ends all its major problems. Once he accomplishes this, he's not even hostile toward the Girls anymore... until he gets bored, at least]].

* Stimpy in ''WesternAnimation/RenAndStimpy'''s first cartoon acts like this -- he wants Ren to be happy after his last invention, the Stay-Put Socks, pisses off Ren. So he builds the Happy Helmet, which ''forces'' him to be happy!

** Twilight Sparkle of all characters borders on this, given her tendancy to resort to BrainwashingForTheGreaterGood in ''Lesson Zero'' and ''Keep Calm and Flutter On'', and otherwise coming up with ''very'' consequential solutions to problems like wanting to ''freeze time'' in ''It's About Time''. In canon she's never gone so far as to cause irrevocable damage, but FanFiction ''loves'' to give her a push [[JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope off the slippery slope]] and turn her into a KnightTemplar or [[RonTheDeathEater full fledged villain]].

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'': [[spoiler: After Steven accidentally un-bubbles the gem in Lion's mane, we meet Bismuth, who was one of the original Crystal Gems. In the final act of that same episode, we discover that she was bubbled by Rose Quartz for developing a weapon that could easily shatter a Gem's gemstone instead of just destroying their physical form (as long as the gemstone is intact, [[FromASingleCell their species can regenerate the body in a matter of minutes)]]. Such a tactic, while it would have likely helped win the GreatOffscreenWar with fewer casualties on the Crystal Gem side, was deemed as [[IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim stooping to Homeworld's level]] by Rose. This sentiment is shared by Steven, which leads to Bismuth beind bubbled once again and the weapon destroyed.]]
* ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'': As of Season 2, it's strongly hinted that [[BigBad Hawkmoth]] might be this. He wants the "ultimate power" that comes with possessing both Ladybug and Chat Noir's {{Transformation Trinket}}s not to TakeOverTheWorld, but simply to bring his beloved wife BackFromTheDead, and it's not yet clear whether or not he actually knows that the only way to accomplish such a feat is via BalancingDeathsBooks. This does not however make him any more of a sympathetic character, given that TheReveal of his motives came as a package with the reveal of his true identity as [[spoiler:Adrien's father.]]

** On the other hand the first thing Bob did as Mayor of Springfield, was to bulldoze the Simpsons house.

** Bob's not the only one to utilize this trope: Jimbo Jones often steals dolls because he believes that they would harm girls. Even Bart Simpson has had shades of this. One particular example had Bart gaining increased intelligence from a drug, but then seemingly growing insane and beginning to believe that the MLB was spying on the town. He then went as far hijacking a tank from a military base, driving it across Springfield, and stopping in front of Springfield Elementary, and then proceeding to fire into the sky (after several tense moments where Bart periodically stopped the cannon on various locations [specifically, Springfield Elementary, The First Church of Springfield, and the Frame Shop, respectively]), shooting down the satellite, all in order to prove that he was indeed telling the truth and was certainly not crazy (well, for the most part).

*** Amanda Waller, meanwhile, [[spoiler: eventually defects from Cadmus, but comes to admire Batman so much that she decides that his genes must continue, even if he himself seems determined to drive away every single potential love interest with his obsessive fixation on "the duty". She does this by genetically modifying an unknowing couple so the man's sperm is genetically Bruce Wayne's-- something that's subtly implied causes their eventual divorce-- and then trying to get an assassin to murder the parents of the resultant sons in the belief that the traumatic murder-by-criminals of both parents is an essential "ingredient" in the recipe for Batman. However, said assassin also happened to be Bruce's former love interest [[WesternAnimation/BatmanMaskOfThePhantasm Andrea Beaumont]], who is ultimately unable to go through with it because it would be going against everything Bruce ever stood for. Realizing she crossed a line, she abandoned the project, but as fate would have it, [[WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond Terry McGinnis]], the end result of her project, would go on to meet Bruce on his own, and lose his father to Derek Powers by chance, thus ensuring that the project was a success. Waller even admits to Terry that she knows she has a lot of sins to answer for with God when her time finally comes.]]

* ''Dante's Inferno: An Animated Epic'' - Dante, before and during his time in the crusades. His unquestioning loyalty in his religious mission causes him to justify the beating of a prisoner for protecting a woman by claiming that he deserved what he got for being a heretic. He also uses his status as a soldier of god to gain comfort from the women whom the beaten prisoner was protecting, despite promising his wife that he would remain true to their marriage.

** Shockingly, [[spoiler:Mojo Jojo]] turns out to be one. His hatred of the Girls is unquestionably wrong, but [[spoiler:when it comes to taking over the world, he actually has its best interests at heart - the moment he takes over, he ends all its major problems. Once he accomplishes this, he's not even hostile toward the Girls anymore... until he gets bored, at least]].
* The Great Computer and his late creator, doctor Shibas, from the French animated series ''WesternAnimation/IlEtaitUneFois l'Espace'' (''Once Upon a Time... Space''). Their objective is the welfare of all sentients and defense against any and all tyrants and dictators, but already when Shibas was still alive they were willing to use the overwhelming military power of the immense and well-equipped army of robots built on Yama to do so. They come close to [[TheExtremistWasRight be right]], what with the general Pest being a mad dictator that [[TheFederation Omega]] cannot deal with due his enormous military strength. Shibas never considering using military strength until the construction crew he had invited from the nearby DeathWorld of Apis to build a city for their people destroyed one of his labs and factories, [[InsaneTrollLogic because he wasn't out there to help them personally instead of sending capable construction robots to do the job]]. They miss being right, though, due the horrible living conditions they force the human inhabitants of Yama and Apis (descendants of the construction crew and the colonists of Apis) into... And, knowing this, the Great Computer is trying to learn how to be a good ruler.
* Stimpy in ''WesternAnimation/RenAndStimpy'''s first cartoon acts like this - he wants Ren to be happy after his last invention, the Stay-Put Socks, pisses off Ren. So he builds the Happy Helmet, which ''forces'' him to be happy!

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'': [[spoiler: After Steven accidentally un-bubbles the gem in Lion's mane, we meet Bismuth, who was one of the original Crystal Gems. In the final act of that same episode, we discover that she was bubbled by Rose Quartz for developing a weapon that could easily shatter a Gem's gemstone instead of just destroying their physical form (as long as the gemstone is intact, [[FromASingleCell their species can regenerate the body in a matter of minutes)]]. Such a tactic, while it would have likely helped win the GreatOffscreenWar with less causalities on the Crystal Gem side, was deemed as [[IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim stooping to Homeworld's level]] by Rose. This sentiment is shared by Steven, which leads to Bismuth beind bubbled once again and the weapon destroyed.]]

** Starlight Glimmer wants to spread friendship and equality throughout all of Equestria...by robbing ponies of their special talents. Starlight, however, turned out to be a [[spoiler: {{hypocrite}} because she had her talent all along (though it is possible that [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation she was going to equalise herself for real once she'd done so to everypony in Equestria, and hadn't done so already because she knew that she would lack the drive to complete her goal]]). This causes all her support to implode and she goes down in history as an evil ruler, undoing any good her methods might have brought. [[spoiler:The Season 5 finale later reveals that she adopted her ideology of friendship through total equality because of a childhood friend, Sunburst, who left her when she was a filly after receiving his cutie mark. This caused her to believe that cutie marks are harmful to friendship, and to create her equality village, in hopes of creating a society where no one could ever boast about being different or being better than others.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'': As of Season 2, it's strongly hinted that [[BigBad Hawkmoth]] might be this. He wants the "ultimate power" that comes with possessing both Ladybug and Chat Noir's {{Transformation Trinket}}s not to TakeOverTheWorld, but siomply to bring his beloved wife BackFromTheDead, and it's not yet clear whether or not he actually knows that the only way to accomplish such a feat is via BalancingDeathsBooks. This does not however make him any more of a sympathetic character, given that TheReveal of his motives came as a package with the reveal of his true identity as [[spoiler:Adrien's father.]]

* Creator/{{Pixar}} has some examples - Pete Docter, director of ''WesternAnimation/{{Up}}'' and ''WesternAnimation/MonstersInc'', even said what he thinks is a "true" villain ("I'm gonna wake up and do evil!") is an unrealistic character.
** Waternoose from ''WesternAnimation/MonstersInc'' is a father-like figure to Sulley and, his motto "We Scare Because We Care" is genuine, as he really does wish to maintain the Monster World through providing energy from children's screams. So, to this ends, he has Randall build a horrifying machine that will suck the screams out of children and, [[EngineeredPublicConfession as he says to Sulley]], is willing to "kidnap a THOUSAND children before he lets the company die...and silence anyone who gets in my way!"
** ''WesternAnimation/WallE'''s AUTO, the autopilot of the ''Axiom'', refuses to let the inhabitants go back to Earth, even though this directive is more than 700 years old and plant life does exist (as shown at the end). But hey, he's a computer. He can't choose ''not'' to follow his programming. He's not so much a [[AIIsACrapshoot crazy A.I.]] as just following an ill-considered directive by a man seven centuries dead. Besides, realistically speaking, one healthy plant does not promise enough resources for the entire population of that huge ship. Which is another reason why Pixar decided to add that lengthy musical montage as the coda.
** Charles Muntz from ''WesternAnimation/{{Up}}'' just wants to catch a bird and prove that he was right. Unfortunately, his methods (after going completely crazy) include killing everybody who shows up at his refuge and gets in his way.

** [[GloriousLeader Kuvira]] is completely correct in her initial points. When she stepped in, the Earth Kingdom had collapsed into anarchy, the heir apparent was a [[RoyalBrat bumbling idiot]] and completely unsuited for the position, and the idea of a monarchy is itself an obsolescent relic in a technological age. That said, her solution is to overthrow the Earth Kingdom and declare an Earth Empire in its place, which [[GoodRepublicEvilEmpire we know is a bad thing]], cementing it by forcing her citizens into slave labor ([[OffstageVillainy offscreen]]), [[PuttingOnTheReich jailing dissenters and anyone of non-Earth ethnicity]], and attempting to forcibly conquer every single state that was ever once part of the Earth Kingdom, including [[spoiler:Zaofu and the long-independent United Republic]]. [[spoiler: In the end, the Earth King accepts her point about the monarchy and voluntarily abdicates to create a republic.]]

* The Great Computer and his late creator, doctor Shibas, from the French animated series ''WesternAnimation/IlEtaitUneFois l'Espace'' (''Once Upon a Time... Space''). Their objective is the welfare of all sentients and defense against any and all tyrants and dictators, but already when Shibas was still alive they were willing to use the overwhelming military power of the immense and well-equipped army of robots built on Yama to do so. They come close to [[TheExtremistWasRight be right]], what with the general Pest being a mad dictator that [[TheFederation Omega]] cannot deal with due his enormous military strength. Shibas never considering using military strength until the construction crew he had invited from the nearby DeathWorld of Apis to build a city for their people destroyed one of his labs and factories, [[InsaneTrollLogic because he wasn't out there to help them personally instead of sending capable construction robots to do the job]]. They miss being right, though, due the horrible living conditions they force the human inhabitants of Yama and Apis (descendants of the construction crew and the colonists of Apis) into... And, [[GenreSavvy knowing this, the Great Computer is trying to learn how to be a good ruler]].

* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'': [[spoiler: The Society of The Blind Eye, whose goal is to help people forget about their bad memories, and to keep them happy and ignorant of the supernatural happenings in Gravity Falls. Unfortunately the memory ray slowly destroys the mind of its target with repeated use, and it most likely caused the stupidity of the townsfolk.]]

* As seen in "[[WesternAnimation/PhineasAndFerb Phineas and Ferb’s]] Quantum Boogaloo" , as a result of Candace busting Phineas and Ferb for their rollercoaster, MoralGuardians embark on a misguided crusade for the abolition of creativity in children, ultimately having children be stored in PeoplePods until adulthood. All for the sake of keeping children safe.

** Sozin started off as this, but as he became older, he became more obsessed with power. [[spoiler: It took until the end of his life for him to acknowledge this, and by then it was too late to change the course he had set.]]

** Starlight Glimmer wants to spread friendship and equality throughout all of Equestria...by robbing ponies of their special talents. This is actually [[DeconstructedTrope deconstructed]], as Starlight turned out to be a [[spoiler: {{hypocrite}} because she had her talent all along (though it is possible that [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation she was going to equalise herself for real once she'd done so to everypony in Equestria, and hadn't done so already because she knew that she would lack the drive to complete her goal]]). This causes all her support to implode and she goes down in history as an evil ruler, undoing any good her methods might have brought. [[spoiler:The Season 5 finale later reveals that she adopted her ideology of friendship through total equality because of a childhood friend, Sunburst, who left her when she was a filly after receiving his cutie mark. This caused her to believe that cutie marks are harmful to friendship, and to create her equality village, in hopes of creating a society where no one could ever boast about being different or being better than others.]]

** Sozin started off as this, but as he became older, he became more obsessed with power. [[spoiler: It took until the end of his life for him to acknowledge this.]]

* The original ''WesternAnimation/{{Superfriends}}'' was full of guys like this, who were trying to save humanity (or thought they were) or one group of people through their actions, without considering the consequences. One example was a scientist who thought shrinking people could solve world hunger. (Since shrunken human ate far less than normal-sized ones, it made sense, right?) Another example was a scientist who altered the Gulf Stream to the point where he could practically control the weather; his intent was to aid his poverty-stricken nation of Glacia with better farmland, even if it crippled the rest of the world, as he was sure nobody else cared about them. (In truth, nobody else had even ''heard'' of them, [[CouldHaveAvoidedThisPlot and simply asking for help]] could have avoided a lot of problems.) Another was an alien from Venus who was trying to make the environment of Earth more like his planet so his people could colonize it, because industrial pollution had made the temperature on Venus too cold for them to tolerate. (Again, simply asking for help never occurred to them.)

* Agent Bishop from ''WesternAnimation/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtles2003'' fits the bill. He seems genuinely concerned with protecting humanity from an AlienInvasion, a noble goal, if he wasn't willing to commit illegal, immoral, and unethical deeds towards it. He kidnapped the Turtles with the intent to dissect them. And this is ''not'' a case of FantasticRacism, as he also held Karai hostage to blackmail Shredder, threatening to her life if his demands weren't met. (The Turtles claim he disgusts them even more than Hun, which Raphael admits "isn't easy to do".)

** Starlight Glimmer wants to spread friendship and equality throughout all of Equestria...by robbing ponies of their special talents. This is actually [[DeconstructedTrope deconstructed]], as Starlight turned out to be a [[spoiler: {{hypocrite}} because she had her talent all along (though it is possible that [[AlternateCharacterInterpretation she was going to equalise herself for real once she'd done so to everypony in Equestria, and hadn't done so already because she knew that she would lack the drive to complete her goal)]]. This causes all her support to implode and she goes down in history as an evil ruler, undoing any good her methods might have brought. [[spoiler:The Season 5 finale later reveals that she adopted her ideology of friendship through total equality because of a childhood friend, Sunburst, who left her when she was a filly after receiving his cutie mark. This caused her to believe that cutie marks are harmful to friendship, and to create her equality village, in hopes of creating a society where no one could ever boast about being different or being better than others.]]

** Starlight Glimmer wants to spread friendship and equality throughout all of Equestria...by robbing ponies of their special talents. This is actually [[DeconstructedTrope deconstructed]], as Starlight turned out to be a [[spoiler: {{hypocrite}} because she had her talent all along]]. This causes all her support to implode and she goes down in history as an evil ruler, undoing any good her methods might have brought. [[spoiler:The Season 5 finale later reveals that she adopted her ideology of friendship through total equality because of a childhood friend, Sunburst, who left her when she was a filly after receiving his cutie mark. This caused her to believe that cutie marks are harmful to friendship, and to create her equality village, in hopes of creating a society where no one could ever boast about being different or being better than others.]]

*** Cloning SuperGirl and rearing her as a living weapon, including dispatching her to murder people on their say-so (Galataea).

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'': [[spoiler: After Steven accidentally un-bubbles the gem in Lion's mane, we meet Bismuth, who was one of the original Crystal Gems. In the final act of that same episode, we discover that she was bubbled by Rose Quartz for developing a weapon that could easily shatter a Gem's gemstone instead of just destroying their physical form (as long as the gemstone is intact, [[FromASingleCell their species can regenerate the body in a matter of minutes)]]. Such a tactic, while it would have likely helped win the GreatOffscreenWar with less causalities on the Crystal Gem side, was deemed as [[IfYouKillHimYouWillBeJustLikeHim stooping to Homeworld's level]] by Rose. This sentiment shared by Steven, which leads to Bismuth beind bubbled once again and the weapon destroyed.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'': [[spoiler: After Steven accidentally un-bubbles the gem in Lion's mane, we meet Bismuth, who was one of the original Crystal Gems. In the final act of that same episode, we discover that she was bubbled by Rose Quartz for developing a weapon that could easily shatter a Gem's gemstone instead of just destroying their physical form (as long as their gemstone is intact, their species can regenerate the body in a matter of minutes).]]

* The Mayor from ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls becomes on in the episode "Hot Air Buffoon." He wanted to fight crime without relying on the girls all the time, so he rides an air balloon with a boxing glove and starts punching out criminals...then he starts punching out innocent citizens in the process. The girls have no choice but to stop him.

* Shockingly, [[spoiler:Mojo Jojo]] in ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'' turns out to be one. His hatred of the Girls is unquestionably wrong, but [[spoiler:when it comes to taking over the world, he actually has its best interests at heart - the moment he takes over, he ends all its major problems. Once he accomplishes this, he's not even hostile toward the Girls anymore... until he gets bored, at least]].