History TooDumbToLive / WesternAnimation

* In Season 2 Episode 5, [[spoiler:Komodo Dragon tears off and eats Rex Splode's hand. Rex's superpower is that anything he touches becomes a bomb, and even if one assumes he can't do the same to his own body parts, he was holding a coin. Do the math.]]

* At the climax of the two-part ''WesternAnimation/GIJoeARealAmericanHero'' episode "There's No Place Like Springfield", Shipwreck steals a chemical the villains are working on (in their town base, called Springfield) that turns water into an explosive, and with Destro and a few mooks in hot pursuit, pours it down the drain of a lab sink. When Destro and the mooks break in, he holds a match over the drain, explaining that the chemical would likely blow up the entire base now that he's poured it into the plumbing system. Destro has a good laugh at this, and tells him a match isn't enough, and it would need something like laser-fire to ignite it; Shipwreck think's he lying and drops the match. Destro isn't lying. OhCrap. But then, the two mooks completely forget what he said, open fire on Shipwreck with their ''laser rifles'', missing, hitting the sink, and... Well, suffice to say now there really ''is'' [[LiteralMetaphor no place like Springfield.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'': The (stunningly naïve) Earth King: fresh from having his EvilChancellor exposed as having deceived and manipulated him for years, he happily explains to the newly-arrived Kyoshi Warriors about the Day of the Black Sun invasion plan. Yes, they had a glowing endorsement from the Gaang, but even if the Warriors weren't actually [[TheDragon Azula]] and her sidekicks in disguise, The Earth King just openly blabbed about a major, secret military operation to a group of warriors he'd met literally seconds ago. And yes, this bites the good guys in the ass in a '''big''' way, later. Especially as the King clearly didn't bother telling them that the enemy knew because of him.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Rugrats}}'': The titular characters have always put themselves in mortal danger during their adventures as a result of their naivety and cluelessness. It's only due to pure luck that they make it out unscathed. {{Justified|Trope}} since they ''are'' only toddlers and [[AdultsAreUseless the adults]] never bother to keep a close eye on them anyway.

*** In "Treehouse Of Horror XVI"'s "Survival Of The Fattest", [[HuntingTheMostDangerousGame Mr. Burns invites some of Springfield's men so that he can hunt them down]], [[MercyLead but allows them a 5-minute head start]]. Comic Book Guy, however, somehow thinks that's worse than ''getting hunted'', saying "Five minutes of running? Shoot me now!". Unsurprisingly, he's the first one immediately killed by Burns. The Blue-Haired Lawyer also counts for typing out a document that would allow Mr. Burns to get away with murdering them, even though he too is one of the people being hunted.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Animaniacs}}'': Mindy has no self-preservation instinct and will follow anything she thinks is cute/interesting even if it leads her to an incredibly dangerous location (from a mail plane to a construction site to a volcano); her dog Buttons is the only reason she survives these incidents ([[LethallyStupid though he suffers a lot of brutal slapstick while keeping her out of danger]]). {{Justified|Trope}}, considering she's three years old and therefore wouldn't know any better, and has pretty negligent parents as well.

** The stupidity of the title characters can reach extreme levels.

* Hank and Dean from ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'' In fact, they ''truly are'' Too Dumb to Live: the show reveals that [[spoiler:they have both died 14 times, mostly due to their own incredible stupidity. Describing them as "death-prone", their father keeps a few [[ReplacementGoldfish clones]] growing in the lab as a precaution.]]

** After being warned by a giant Dracula head made out of flames that they were to leave the country within one year for killing his wife, the people not only ignore it, they actually host a celebration for the day she was killed. Dracula's coming sounds as angered as he is annoyed at the villagers sheer stupidity as he releases an army of demons in the town. Driving the point home, after it has become publicly knowledge that demonic forces intend to kill every living being left in Wallachia, people go on their daily lives normally instead of running like there's no tomorrow or organizing any form of defense against them.

** Steve Williams. Considering his severe stupidity, it's astonishing he even manages to stay alive. According to "Two Weeks Notice", he has contracted ''multiple'' [=STDs=] from injecting himself with a syringe from the trash, eating a homeless man's sandwich in exchange for five bucks, and becoming blood brothers with a bunch of African tribe members.

** "[[Recap/AdventureTimeS4E1HotToTheTouch Hot to the Touch]]" demonstrates that while Flame Princess is very powerful, she is not a very smart combatant. At one point, she ambushes Finn and Jake... and literally announces out loud "I am ambushing you!" If Finn actually wanted her dead (which he didn't), she most likely would be at that point. In fact, Flame Princess' strategy often involves being a LeeroyJenkins, as demonstrated in "Vault of Bones", as she finds strategizing boring.

** In the episode "The Limit", we meet the Hot Dog Knights, who are described by their own princess as being slow. When two of them (along with our heroes) are granted wishes:

** In the episode "All Your Fault", Lemongrab and his clone have turned ''all'' of the food that Princess Bubblegum has supplied them into living beings, then when Finn and Jake give them seeds to regrow their crops, they bring those to life as well, [[NeverMyFault so they continue to blame PB for their suffering]] and send their largest creation to attack the Candy Kingdom. Had PB not erased the life-bringing formula from their brains at the end of the episode, the Lemon Kingdom's population would be wiped out and the Candy Kingdom would be in rubble.
** In "From Bad to Worse", the candy people are turned into zombies and eventually infect Jake. Jake then seals himself in a "sciency shower" to prevent himself from infecting Finn and Lady Rainicorn. Finn and Jake both tell Rainicorn not to let him out of the shower. Care to take a guess what she does?
** "Hot to the Touch" demonstrates that, while Flame Princess is very powerful, she is not a very smart combatant. At one point, she ambushes Finn and Jake... and literally announces out loud "I am ambushing you!" If Finn actually wanted her dead (which he didn't), she most likely would be at that point. In fact, Flame Princess' strategy often involves being a LeeroyJenkins, as demonstrated in "Vault of Bones", as she finds strategizing boring.

** In "Mad as a Hatter", the MadHatter takes his secretary out on the town after a breakup. Somehow she fails to notice that everyone serving them has an extremely conspicuous card reading "In This Style 10/6" on their heads (the Hatter's mind-control device), and fails to pick up on Tetch's crush on her until it's too late.
** In "Holiday Knights", the crowd of New Year's Day revelers don't see any danger in hanging around while the Joker works on something in plain sight right on center stage. They even put on the Joker-face masks he distributed, unconcerned that they might be poisoned or booby-trapped. Maybe they were [[AlcoholInducedStupidity just that drunk]]. This being several hours after he threatened to kill as many people as he could before the New Year. Alcohol or not, being anywhere near a man who has recently broadcast a terrorist threat against an entire city is just ''dumb''.
* The ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheBraveAndTheBold'' episode "Chill of the Night!", retells the story of Batman confronting [[TokenMotivationalNemesis Joe Chill]] over the fact that Chill killed his parents. Like in the original story, Chill runs out to get some criminals to help him -- and reveals his role in the creation of Batman while doing so. Unlike the original story, though, where it was just goons, the criminals he tells this to are members of Batman's rogues gallery, including the Joker -- and in both stories, the people Chill tells this to don't take too kindly to Chill being the reason Batman exists, and while it's implied the Spectre killed him, the rogues still tried to kill Chill first.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Castlevania}}'': After being warned by a giant Dracula head made out of flames that they were to leave the country within one year for killing his wife, the people not only ignore it, they actually host a celebration for the day she was killed. Dracula's coming sounds as angered as he is annoyed at the villagers sheer stupidity as he releases an army of demons in the town. Driving the point home, after it has become publicly knowledge that demonic forces intend to kill every living being left in Wallachia, people go on their daily lives normally instead of running like there's no tomorrow or organizing any form of defense against them.
** Prior Sala, one of the [[ArcVillain Arc Villains]] of Season 3, fatally stabs the Judge in the season finale. The Judge then tells Sala where he can find an escape route to get away from Trevor and Sypha. Sala questions why the Judge would help him, but when the Judge insists that he isn't lying, Sala believes him and tries to take the escape route. He ends up on the receiving end of the Judge's DeathTrap.

** The space snake in "Rattlestar Ricklactica" is the first snake of its planet to go to space as an astronaut. Its first instinct upon finding Morty, who is much bigger than itself, is to bite him in the ankle for no discernible reason, leading to Morty smashing its helmet open.

** Steve Williams. Considering his severe stupidity, it's astonishing he even manages to stay alive. According to "Two Weeks Notice", he has contracted ''multiple'' [=STDs=] from injecting himself with a syringe he found from the trash, eating a homeless man's sandwich in exchange for five bucks, and becoming blood brothers with a bunch of African tribe members.

* Plenty of characters on ''WesternAnimation/RickAndMorty'' have made unwise decisions before, but when one guy gets splashed with some of Rick's fake acid in "The Vat of Acid Episode", he thinks that means he's [[SophisticatedAsHell "impervious to acid".]] So what does he do? He goes on a talk show and gets himself dipped into a real vat of acid -- ''without even bothering to test it first.'' [[NightmareFuel The result is exactly what you'd expect it to be.]]

*** In "Treehouse Of XXVI"'s "Wanted: Dead, Then Alive", Sideshow Bob lures Bart into a trap with the intention of shooting Bart with a Harpoon Gun. Rather than make any attempt to trick Bob as he had done in the past, escape, or even make any real attempt to try to avoid being shot, Bart just mockingly dances [[BullyingADragon mocking Sideshow Bob for his past incompetence and even drawing an X on his forehead daring Bob to shoot him.]] Bart still doesn't get it after Sideshow Bob does actually shoot him through the chest. Bart continues mocking Bob for a few seconds before [[YouAreAlreadyDead finally realizing he's dead after Bob pulls his heart out with the Harpoon.]]
** In "Bart Gets An Elephant", Homer got stuck in a tar pit. He first tried to pull out his legs with each arm, getting his arms and legs stuck. Then he tried to use his head to pull out his arms. Stampy was the only reason Homer survived.
** In "Homie the Clown" Krusty bet against the Harlem Globetrotters, which results in multiple assassination attempts on Krusty by the Springfield mob due to the resulting debt.[[note]]For those who don't know, the Globetrotters are part of a choreographed halftime show and always win, except for one time in 1971.[[/note]]

** Ralph's father Chief Wiggum is almost as dense, and exemplifies JugglingLoadedGuns to the point where he's the page image. He eats donuts off the barrel of his gun (then continues after accidentally shooting his hat), tries to kill a fly that landed on his nose with his gun, wipes his sweat off with a handkerchief that was supposed to help track down Milhouse (causing the police dogs to attack ''him''), etc. He miraculously never gets himself killed, [[LethallyStupid although his undercover men don't get off so easily.]]

* Ralph's father Chief Wiggum is almost as dense, and exemplifies JugglingLoadedGuns to the point where he's the page image. He eats donuts off the barrel of his gun (then continues after accidentally shooting his hat), tries to kill a fly that landed on his nose with his gun, wipes his sweat off with a handkerchief that was supposed to help track down Milhouse (causing the police dogs to attack ''him''), etc. He miraculously never gets himself killed, [[LethallyStupid although his undercover men don't get off so easily.]]

** It's an outright miracle that Ralph Wiggum is alive, because the kid has no self preservation awareness. In one future episode, he has a bunch of clones who get killed in rapid succession because of various lethal mistakes (accidentally shooting himself in the head, getting run over a truck, crashing the same truck into a building, and setting fire to the clones in the back of the truck). Must be a family trait, as his father Chief Wiggum is almost as dense.

* In an episode of ''WesternAnimation/DanVs'', Dan cooks up a poisonous meatloaf to feed to the animals at the animal shelter because he can't sleep during the night. His friend Chris comes around and ''ends up eating'' the meatloaf even after Dan has told him about his plan. Chris ends up having to be hospitalized.

*** In "Treehouse Of Horror XVI"'s "Survival Of The Fattest", [[HuntingTheMostDangerousGame Mr. Burns invites some of Springfield's men so that he can hunt them down]], [[MercyLead but allows them a 5-minute head start]]. Comic Book Guy, however, somehow thinks that's worse than ''getting hunted'', saying "Five minutes of running? Shoot me now!". Unsurprisingly, he's the first one immediately killed by Burns.

** [[AdultsAreUseless Most of the adult cast]] qualifies but Randy Marsh takes the cake. Drives drunk with his kid and friends, purposely gets into drunken fights in little league games, gets Finland nuked off the face of the planet, is responsible for the death of his daughter's boyfriend.... His stupidity risks himself and pretty much anybody caught in the line of his scheme. He also gives himself cancer just so he can get medical marijuana.

** It's an outright miracle that Ralph Wiggum is alive, the kid has no self preservation awareness. Must be a family trait as his Father Chief Wiggum is almost as dense.

* In the episode "Dial Meg For Murder", [[AlphaBitch Connie D'Amico]] and her friends make the shortsighted decision to tease Meg, who has just been released from jail and has already been terrorizing her family, and pay for it when Meg beats them to a pulp.