All Of The Other Reindeer / Western Animation

Characters who are treated poorly by the majority in Western Animation.

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• An Aaahh!!! Real Monsters episode has Ickis meeting a monster that was ostracized by his fellow monsters because his face looks just like a human's.
• Amphibia: Justified. The frog-townfolks of Wartwood don't trust the human protagonist, Anne Boonchuy, at best or mistreat her at worst, both out of Fantastic Racism and an understandable fear of a never before seen creature from another world they know nothing about. They get better after the events of "Toad Tax".
• Batman: The Brave and the Bold: Plastic Man appears to be disliked by most heroes apart from Batman. He even mentions he was kicked out of the Justice League because they didn't want him around.
• In The Brothers Flub the main protagonist Fraz Flub is made fun of and bullied by everyone around him including his friends and brother.
• Jay Sherman from The Critic. He gets it from his boss, his make-up lady and the many people who disagree with his views on films. He does take steps to gain more respect, and manages to do so when he goes to truck driving school and impresses his fellow truckers both with his endurance behind the wheel and his knowledge of film. However, in his primary career, not even winning a Pulitzer Prize gets Jay any cred from his peers.
• Danny Phantom. His ghost alter-ego is hunted and hated, while his human half is bullied and victimized by the more popular students of his school. The former improves over time throughout the run of the series. The latter... well, at least he has his True Companions.
• Ed, Edd n Eddy: The three title characters are known for being disliked and harassed by just about every character on the show, except the Kankers (that instead are prone to sexually harass the Eds). This is mostly because of their leader Eddy who always tries to scam people out of their money. If you look at it from the kids' view, it's really Eddy who they hate since they are seen getting along with Ed and Edd when Eddy is not around... Most of the time when all three of the Eds receive punishment, it is usually Eddy's fault. Eddy is the only one who actually deserves this. Reversed in the movie when Eddy reveals his Freudian Excuse involving him and his brother, at which point all three Eds finally gain acceptance by the other kids.
• Family Guy:
  • Meg is the Family Whipping Post (oftentimes from Peter).
  • Peter Griffin became the victim of this in the episode where he discovers he's part-black, where he's put down by whites for insulting them on the news and by the blacks for selfishly squandering a large sum of money rather than donating it to a black charity. When Peter says he feels mistreated like a leper, the leper next to him won't let him have a seat.
• Wilt from Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends. While he's well-known for being one of the best imaginary friends in the show in terms of good deeds, and occasionally gets some form of recognition for his actions, far more often, his natural kindness gets either taken advantage of or stomped all over. Examples include:
  • The destruction of a chandelier he had been working for six hours on,
  • Not acquiring his own room despite having the best reason to obtain it (living the longest in the house without his own room and the room being custom-made for him),
  • And an episode dedicated to everyone he comes in contact with immediately using his inability to say no to force him to do chores and such for them while a game he'd been dying to see was on. The episode results in being imprisoned twice, finally reaching home the moment the game ends, and once he finally learns to say no and stand up for his own needs once in a while, the episode ends when he accidentally says yes to another chore and the door being slammed in his face before he can correct himself.
• In Frankenstein's Cat, none of the Doctor's other creations like Nine, and Lottie is constantly tormented by the other children of of Oddsburg.
• The Future is Wild: In the episode "Be True to Your Crew", the main character, C.G., tells her father that in truth, she has never really fit in with others her age and wouldn't want her crewmates and friends from the 21st century to feel the alienation that comes from feeling different the way she did. This indicates that she is an outcast among her peers. Because of this, she has a hard relating to others her age, has no understanding of social customs, and is socially awkward when she meets Ethan, Emily and Luis. She gets better though thanks to her crewmates making a much better a person than she ever was.
• Gargoyles uses this both ways: the heroes are constantly abused by the very people they're trying to protect, who generally scream and run away from, or else attack, their rescuers. Meanwhile, resident Big Bad Demona has long ago cracked under the strain and decided on "kill them all". While it certainly falls under this trope, people in the show do show a variety of responses to the Gargoyles, and the reactions generally are not too unrealistic, especially given they've been blamed for a variety of bad circumstances, some of it deservedly.
• In Generator Rex the main character, Rex, is constantly called a freak for being an E.V.O. and even sometimes is threatened.
• Invader Zim:
  • Dib is king of this trope. He is tormented on a regular basis by his peers due to his belief in the paranormal — which, in this Crapsack World, often means "not being as dumb as a sack of bricks." All the while he is constantly battling the alien Zim, who his classmates regard as a normal (if green) human kid.
  • As a subversion of the standard hero reaction to the trope, Dib doesn't always take the abuse in stride; he argues with people a lot, and in "Room With a Moose" he seriously contemplates falling into Zim's latest trap just so he can take his classmates down with him. In an Unfinished Episode ("Mopiness of Doom") he does the opposite, deciding that the paranormal isn't worth all the pain he suffers and temporarily quits. In both cases he doesn't renege because he cares what happens to humanity, but because he wants to beat Zim.
    • Except in fanfiction; in a trope specific to the fandom, many writers actually have Dib turn evil and team up with Zim to destroy humanity out of spite, since Zim, at least, seems to hold some kind of healthy respect for Dib. Although even many of these have Dib regret his actions after the fact.
  • Zim himself, who is the laughing stock of the Irken Empire. Justified as he actually deserves that reputation, though ... not that it matters, since he's oblivious to it and convinced he's the best thing ever.
• Kaeloo:
  • Stumpy is treated horribly by all of the other characters on the show for no reason at all and repeatedly mocked for things he can't control. This is taken to the point where in season 4, a Running Gag was for someone to explain the rules of a game and ask if "everyone except Stumpy" understood before starting to play.
  • Olaf was kicked out of the ice caps where he lived and left to drift at sea on an iceberg by the other emperor penguins for "marrying" an ice cube.
• Kim Possible:
  • As revealed in the episode "Attack of the Killer Bebes," Doctor Drakken's descent into megalomaniacal mad science can be traced to being made fun of in college, by Kim's father and their mutual friends. "Made fun of," meaning "one singular incident of mockery"; Drakken (then the not-blue Drew Lippski) promised Dr. Possible and his roommates that he'd provide blind dates for a sockhop. When the day of the dance comes, Drew shows up with four utterly ridiculous fembots he built himself, that look like they started life as industrial vacuum cleaners. The three non-roboticists instantly bust up laughing at the ludicrous sight, and start poking fun at Drew about exactly how ludicrous it is. The way Dr. Possible recounts the story, he clearly still thinks he was a lot less mean about the whole thing than Drakken did, especially since (aside from the robots) he seems to remember Drakken pretty fondly.
  • Ron is treated with a lot of disrespect by his high school peers, the only exception being Kim. Though despite that, his peers approve of his relationship with Kim (they actually cheer when they finally get together.) He loses their disrespect all together when he becomes the star running back.
• Tim from The Life & Times of Tim is regularly put down around the office by the other employees. They also tend to call him "Tim the idiot." His boss always singles him out to do random and unpleasant favors for him. Not those kind of favors.
• My Life as a Teenage Robot: No matter what Jenny does, she pretty much always ends up the school’s resident freak just because she’s a robot, although she does get her respect at times.
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
  • Fluttershy has been mistreated since childhood and into adulthood. It started off from the fact that she was a weak flyer suffering from confidence issues, and the fact that she is the only pegasus pony who has more of a connection to the earth than to the sky probably does not help. Also, a number of ponies think she is an Extreme Doormat and will not hesitate to act like Jerkasses towards her. Fortunately, she has taken steps to being treated with more respect.
  • Thorax preferred to play with dolls rather than practice fighting like all the other changelings in his hive and was bullied for it. When he grew up, he refused to attack ponies and instead wanted to share in the friendships he saw amongst them, which led him to abandon his hive and thus be branded a traitor to his own species. As is fitting for the theme of the show, it all works out for him in the end.
  • It also happens to Thorax's brother Pharynx after the changeling hive as a whole goes full non-violent Granola and he refuses to change, seeing the new hive as weak and helpless and taking extreme measures to make himself heard. It ends in a compromise: Pharynx lightens up (emotionally and physically) and the rest of the hive realizes that yes they totally are helpless and need to toughen back up to deal with rogue monsters that attack their home.
• The Owl House: Implied. The first episode establishes that Luz Noceda is a weird girl that unintentionally causes trouble in her school with her wild imagination, weird behavior, and antics disturbing her classmates. Luz's mother points out that her behavior is why she does not have any friends. It was unknown how Luz's classmates treated her at first, but in season 2, two episodes implied that Luz was ostracized by her classmates and was bullied severely.
  • "Knock, Knock, Knockin' on Hooty's Door" implied that Luz was made fun of in the past for being cheesy; that episode also heavily implied that she had other crushes but was rejected.
  • In "Yesterday's Lie", when Luz discovers that Vee was impersonating her, and she's shocked to discover Vee had her own group of friends she made in camp. It is heavily implied that Luz suffers from a social anxiety disorder because of all the bullying she suffered from her peers. Luz gives Vee advice on approaching a group of teenagers she assumes to be bullies and almost has a panic attack when Vee goes over to them (not knowing that they are Vee's friends). It also indicated that outside of her mother, she does not miss her old life on Earth and would be more than willing just to let Vee continue to live it in her place indefinitely.
  • In the episode "Thanks to Them", Camila’s nightmare shows us that she was even look down upon by other kids’ parents for her quirks.
• The titular hero of Sprout's Olive the Ostrich, who buries her head in the sand to have imaginative adventures. When she pokes her head out of the sand, her father pokes fun at her for daydreaming again, her mother tells her that her head's "been in the sand too long" and her brother laughs at her. It's probably no coincidence that her name is "Olive."
• Pantheon: Maddie, Justine, and Caspian all suffer this in different ways. Maddie is cyberbullied by a cruel Alpha Bitch and her posse who suicide bait and humiliate her, Caspian is thought of as a creepy loner by most of his peers, and Justine is ostracized and avoided because of her weight. Fortunately, Maddie and Justine become friends while Caspian starts to bond with the more outgoing and friendly Hannah.
• Pet Alien:
  • Virtually nobody in DeSpray Bay likes Tommy Cadle. Clinton bullies him, Melba bosses him around and Granville views him as a threat to Melba's affections. Even Gabby, the nicest of the bunch, is a creepy stalker who sometimes joins in on the other kids' bullying. The adults treat him as a nuisance at best and actively bully him at worst. Tommy gets along better with the aliens, but Dinko and Scruffy are the only aliens who consistently like him; Swanky is a jerk who wants Tommy's bedroom for himself and both Gumpers and Flip sometimes screw with Tommy for their own amusement.
  • To an even bigger extent than Tommy, no one likes Granville. Melba spurns his advances and frequently attacks him, Clinton bullies him, Gabby once tried to attack him for mocking Tommy and both Tommy and the aliens find him annoying and obnoxious. The only character who even remotely gets along with him is Swanky (through their similar personalities), and even then, he prefers to be with the other aliens because of how boring Granville is.
• In the Ready Jet Go! episode "Visit to Mom's Office", when Jet is telling Dr. Rafferty (Sean's mother), that he is an alien, she says that she felt like an alien when she was a kid.
• Recess
  • Randall Weems is the biggest example, as well as a rare unsympathetic one. Reason: he's The Stool Pigeon, and a rather smug and malicious one at that. This is perhaps most prominent in the beginning of "First Name Ashley," where all of the student body shuns him for trying to eavesdrop on their conversations.
  • Gus Griswald immediately became unpopular for being the new kid, one tradition of the school's student body, and being a little shy and dweeby did not help. Gus eventually escapes the new kid label, but doesn't always escape the stigma because of it. For example, in "The Lost Ball," he goes through Once Done, Never Forgotten when he accidentally kicks a ball into "The Yard of No Return."
  • While Mikey Blumberg is a nice guy, there are plenty of kids who don't respect him because he can come across as too nice and because he can be a bit of a Extreme Doormat; the latter of which a lot of kids take advantage of to push him around. In the episode "Rumor Mill", Mikey decides to stand up to his tormenters by starting a rumor about him losing his temper over another kid spilling his popcorn.
• The Ren & Stimpy Show: In "The Littlest Giant", Stimpy makes up a fairy tale about a giant who is teased for being shorter than all the other giants in his homeland of Hugevania.
• Rick and Morty: Averted; Morty Smith was never show to be unpopular or a outcast. He was only shown to be bullied once in the pilot and despite not having any friends no one has a problem being around him, including his crush Jessica, a beautiful and popular girl. However, by the sixth season, his career of careening around the multiverse with his grandpa has gotten him a reputation such that the other kids, though not antagonistic toward him personally, are still afraid to have him around.
• The Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer Rankin/Bass special is probably the most famous telling of that story; in this version, even Santa Claus is mean to Rudolph! This also applies to his best friend, Hermey, a Christmas Elf who would rather be a dentist than make toys. However, the special actually Subverts part of this trope — everyone's Heel Realization comes before the snowstorm, so Rudolph's acceptance isn't just because he's suddenly useful.
  • The trope is downplayed in the GoodTimes Entertainment version of the story — while Rudolph still gets picked on by the other fawns, Santa and his parents are a lot nicer and more accepting of him.
• In Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated, the locals treat the gang as, at best, a nuisance and, at worst, a group of destructive vigilantes owing to their inconvenient habit of saving a town filled with stupid, submissive and greedy jackasses from themselves.
• The Simpsons:
  • With the exception of Maggie Simpson, the immediate Simpson family are occasionally put down by their hometown, Springfield. The people of Springfield are generally known to fair-weathered and fickle, earning the reputation of "Meanest Town in America". There is even a "Code of the Schoolyard" in Springfield Elementary School, where children amongst themselves are expected to always make fun of those different from them. This trope is usually put into effect due to Homer's blunders, Bart's mischief, or a series of events which bring out the town's general nastiness.
    • When Homer Simpson plays the role of Paul Bunyan in the episode, "Simpsons Tall Tales":
      Homer: Oh, I get it. When I'm crushing and killing you, you don't like me. But when I can save your life, suddenly I'm Mr. Popular.
      Lenny: Yeah, that's pretty much it.
      Homer: Woo hoo! I'm Mr. Popular!
    • There is even an episode plot in Season 23, where the people of Springfield decide to exile the Simpson family.
  • Save for Bart (sometimes), Milhouse is disliked or ignored by virtually everyone
• South Park:
  • Though purely comedic, Butters Stotch has his alter ego, Professor Chaos, lash out at his peers for being unpopular. This is mainly due to his aversion to the manly, rebellious behavior exhibited by his peers; Butters is frequently ostracized due to his effeminate and meek personality. This has been toned down in recent seasons, where he is accepted by most of the kids at school and even develops a healthy, friendly relationship with the man cast. And it should be noted that as unpopular as Butters is, he was never hated at the level of Eric Cartman.
  • At the start of the series, Stan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman and Kenny McCormick were relatively well-liked by their classmates, and were perfectly willing to bully their less popular peers. However, as the show went on, a combination of Character Development and Characterization Marches On (that generally made them more sympathetic to fans) led their social status to become much more fragile. According to Craig, all of the other kids think they're assholes. Even if he was exaggerating, it still isn't all that unusual for their popularity to dip beneath Butters'. Though their popularity is constantly in flux, being despised by their peers in some episodes, and having sleepovers with them in others. Generally speaking, Stan, Kyle and Kenny are usually in good standing with the other kids, although they have a rivalry now with Craig, Clyde and Token who have their own little group. The lightning rod of the disdain is, of course, Eric Cartman, who is the most hated kid in school by far. As much as the other kids pick on Butters, their hatred of Cartman is exponentially greater.
• In Space Chickens IN Space , the academy students hate Chuck due to his selfishness and laugh at him whether he deserves it or not.
• SpongeBob SquarePants: For the obvious reason in "Nature Pants". Spongebob is shunned and zapped out of Jellyfish Fields because he is CLEARLY not a jellyfish.
• In Thunder Cats 2011, the Proud Warrior Race Catfolk of the magical kingdom of Thundera regard their crown prince Lion-O as a Cloudcuckoolander for his obsession with mythical "technology", a Category Traitor for his defense of enemy Lizard Folk scavengers, a Cultural Rebel and a thoroughly Inadequate Inheritor and The Wrongful Heir to the Throne when compared to his brother Tygra.
• The protagonist clock in the Disney short Tick Tock Tale gets made fun of by the other clocks because he has a goofy design.
• Both the 1947 short version and the 1975 feature version of Tubby the Tuba feature a cute tuba who dreams of playing melodies instead of rhythm, only to be laughed at and jeered by the rest of the orchestra.
• Ironically defied in “The Wild Thornberrys” episode “On The Right Track.” A little reindeer named Scoot is the slowest of all the reindeer trying out for the big reindeer sled race. In spite of that, Scoot is actually friends with the other reindeer. These reindeer even show their sympathy when Scoot doesn’t qualify for the race. The only other reindeer who opposes Scoot is his rival, Dank.

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