Western Animation / Unintentionally Unsympathetic

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Unintentionally Unsympathetic in Western Animation.

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Adventure Time: The Earl of Lemongrab in his second appearance. We're supposed to feel sorry for him because he's lonely, and his clone appearing is treated as a happy ending, but given that he throws a fit about it, essentially tortures a Candy Person, and tries to kill Finn and Jake (not to mention the fact that in his first appearance he was directly responsible for sinking the Fubblegum ship), it's hard to. Later on, he becomes intentionally unsympathetic, in contrast to both his clone and his own re-made self after he is momentarily Killed Off for Real.
The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius: In the episode "Men At Work", the titular genius and his friends get a job at a fast food joint. Jimmy is working the register but instead of ringing up the customers' orders on the cash register, he memorizes the prices and does the taxes and change in his head. His manager chastises him for this, telling him to use the register which Jimmy brushes off. You're supposed to feel sorry for Jimmy because his super-genius mind is unappreciated, but in reality what he was doing was illegal under-the-table transactions for a business that needs all transactions monitored by the register for the sake of inventory and taxes. His method is also unable to provide a sales receipt to the customers. Later in that episode, he's asked to mop up the restaurant floor. When the manager tells him he missed a spot of spilled salt, he insists on correcting him and calling it by its chemical name: "sodium chloride." To be fair, the manager was kind of a ditz and demoted him because he thought Jimmy didn't even know what salt was and thought he was too stupid for mop duty. But Jimmy using scientific names in a simple fast-food job to begin with is textbook Insufferable Genius behavior, and it should have come as no surprise that talking back to his manager for trivial reasons got him in trouble.
Sonic in Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog can come across as this, with the villains being The Chew Toys of the series, and Sonic, like any traditional slapstick hero, taking perverse pleasure in exacerbating it for them. Then again, Robotnik and his minions are trying to enslave the Mobians.
Archer has lead female character Lana Kane. She is supposed to come off as the Only Sane Man in a cast of highly dysfunctional idiots, but her Never My Fault tendencies in relationships, undeserved arrogance, utter hypocrisy, and behavior that could charitably be considered as abusive made her extremely disliked, particularly as the show went on. With the show's other characters, they are all fairly convincingly insane and/or sociopathic and thus a lot of their actions are somewhat understandable, but Lana does many of the same things, and is mentally stable enough that she really should know better. This is especially apparent when you compare her to Archer himself; yes, Archer is a jackass, but the show does such a good job explaining his Freudian Excuse that Lana's behavior seems much more cruel by comparison. Then there's the finale of Season 12. While Robert cheating on Lana is wrong and seeing Lana crying over it is sad, she'd spent most of the season being distant and rude towards Robert, heavily flirting with other men, having already basically cheated on him in Japan and would have actually cheated on Robert with Prince Fawad had he not passed out, and when this is brought up by Robert, she completely deflects the blame and doesn't accept any real fault for her actions either, so it's hard to really sympathize with her here.
Arthur:
- D.W. in "Arthur's Big Hit". The audience is supposed to feel sorry for her because Arthur hits her after losing his temper, but the problem is that she loses any sympathy she may have otherwise received by a) repeatedly bothering Arthur when he is trying to build his model plane (even ruining the paint job after she had been told not to touch anything), b) throwing the model out of the window, even though she had absolutely no right whatsoever to touch it, and c) blaming Arthur for building a plane that can't fly, instead of apologizing for her actions.
- Another example involving D.W. is "D.W.'s Very Bad Mood", wherein the audience is supposed to sympathize with her because she didn't get invited to a birthday party that Lisa, one of her classmates, is throwing. However, throughout the episode, rather than act sad about it, D.W. has a violent temper tantrum that lasts several days, wherein she screams at the top of her lungs, insults her brother and parents, and slams the doors through the house all through the night, among other things. Adding to that is Jane and David do not punish her in any meaningful way, forcing Arthur to enlist Francine's help in finding out what's wrong with her. And as if all of that isn't enough, D.W. even considers wrecking Lisa's birthday party in an Imagine Spot before Francine cheers her up by inviting her to her own birthday party.
  - It's made even worse when it's revealed that D.W. admits that she doesn't even like Lisa, but that her best friend Emily got invited, meaning she felt like she had to be invited to the birthday party of a girl she's made clear she doesn't like just because her best friend did, and when Francine invites D.W. to her own birthday party, D.W. immediately celebrates, not the fact that she gets to go to a birthday, but that she now wants to rub it in Lisa's face that she got invited to an older girl's birthday party. Plainly put, the entire thing stems from D.W. being extremely entitled as well as mean-spirited towards a classmate who we never even see treat D.W. badly.
- Mr. and Mrs. Read also fall into this in "Arthur's Big Hit". We are obviously meant to side with them since they tell Arthur that it's not okay to hit people, no matter what. However, they become massive hypocrites by showing No Sympathy for Arthur when Binky hits him for far less understandable reasons. As far as they know? Arthur was hit for no apparent reason. Their response of of "Well now you know how D.W. felt when you hit her!" just makes them feel like they were kicking Arthur when he was down. Not helping matters is the fact that, despite saying "we'll deal with what she did", they're never actually shown punishing D.W. for destroying Arthur's property.
- Arthur himself comes across this way in the episode "Arthur Rides the Bandwagon". When a new line of toys called Woogles becomes all the rage, we're supposed to side with Arthur, the only one who doesn't see what's so great about it, which is all well and good, but during the first half Arthur is seen acting like a Holier Than Thou snob, calling his friend's new toys stupid right to their faces unprovoked and then getting frustrated when they disagree with him. We're obviously supposed to see this as him standing up to peer pressure, but since they were simply showing him their new toys (which hardly qualifies as peer pressure) and Arthur really has no right to tell his friends what they can and can't like, and they're doing no harm with the Woogles, it comes off as unnecessarily harsh and uncalled for. Francine's actions at the end, in which she offers him a Woogle in exchange for him saying he really wants one, seem a bit more understandable in this context, considering how rude he'd been earlier in saying he didn't want one. To make matters worse, Arthur "fixes" things by starting a new trend, giving off the message that you're only allowed to like something popular if your friend decides it is.
- In "So Funny I Forgot to Laugh", Arthur's friends giving him the Silent Treatment, calling him a "bully", and refusing to let him eat lunch with them is meant to be karmic since he took a joke towards Sue Ellen too far. However, among them were Francine and Muffy, who are both quite mouthy and often insult others, so their accusations of Arthur being a bully seem hypocritical.
The Mighty Avengers in the Ultron Revolution season on Avengers Assemble. We're supposed to kind of understand why they've become enforcers for Inhuman registration even though they're clearly working for the bad guys, and it kind of works. But then they have their Heel Realisation when Ms Marvel is expected to register, and this makes them look worse, because it's like they were able to quell their consciences about enforcing the law on others, but didn't expect it to apply to them.
To a large number of fans, Dodie from As Told by Ginger is the definition of a "toxic friend"; however the show itself doesn't treat her nearly as bad as the fans see her. She rarely gets her just desserts for doing stuff like trying to break up her best friend's romance or tattling what kids have lice, and Ginger never abandons her for being overly clingy and back-stabbing. Most notably when she and Marcie cross the line by conspiring with Miranda to break up Ginger and Darren and Courtney helps Ginger find out, the episode ends on an ominous note, and then nothing next time. For a series with strong continuity, it's a shocking thing to ignore.
Batman: The Killing Joke has both Batman and Batgirl, especially within the scenes with them having sex.
- For Batgirl, the prologue featuring her does very little to make her sympathetic, despite the writers' claims that it makes her a stronger character. Her character arc revolves around her pining after Batman and then acting like a jilted lover. She irrationally attacks a man arguing with his girlfriend. And she displays very little of the independence and heroism often associated with the character, instead coming off like a thrill-seeking Stalker with a Crush. It doesn't help that personality-wise, she has nothing in common with her comic or TV counterparts.
- Batman isn't much better, as shortly after his claim that the Starter Villain is "objectifying" Batgirl, he has sex with her. And then refuses to talk about it afterward, leaving her feeling and acting like a jilted lover. Also, his interactions with Jim Gordon afterward are soured since now he's had sex with Jim's daughter and is keeping that a secret from him.
During the third season of Beast Wars, the writers focused on Blackarachnia's redemption arc and while she was meant to be rooted for, there were several factors that worked against her and she didn't quite come off as a fully sympathetic character. For one, Blackarachnia complained how the Maximals didn't trust her, but she had spent two seasons attacking the Maximals and unlike Dinobot (who had never properly met the Maximals before their ships crashed on Earth and who defected in the middle of his first fight with them), she had a good deal of bad blood with them. Plus, she had been the one who had (unintentionally) led Megatron to the Ark in the first place in a quest to get the power of the Ark for herself, allowing Megatron a chance to try to assassinate Optimus Prime and create a timestorm so when she turned against Megatron out of self-preservation, she didn't build a strong foundation of trust with the Maximals to begin with. There was also the fact that she didn't act any differently under the Maximals than she did Megatron, secretly stealing equipment from the ship and the Transmetal II driver Depth Charge had thrown into the lava to work her own agenda in secrecy. And despite some mistrust between her and the Maximals, they did make some attempts to give her a chance because in "Proving Grounds," Rattrap relented and allowed Silverbolt to go retrieve Blackarachnia without snitching on them, despite his dislike for her. At the end of the episode, Optimus tells Blackarachnia that the choice to be reprogrammed into a Maximal was her choice alone.
- What's especially bad about this is that said "reprogramming" involves removing a Predacon "shell program" Tarantulas embeded into her when the Predacons first got a hold of her, and afterwards, she undergoes no personality changes whatsoever. She still had the same sarcastic, abrasive personality, the only difference was she was on the good guys' side....which she already was.
- The Maximals in general and Optimus in particular also come off badly in regards to this storyline, partly due to Primal initially claiming "She may be made of Maximal parts, but she's Predacon to the core!" Despite 1. Dinobot and Rhinox having both come back from temporary Heel Turns and 2. After BA becomes a Maximal, Primal and the others never show any instance in getting back Quickstrike and Inferno, who were also their own men, going so far as to leave them for dead at the end of the series without so much as a brief mention. With Cheetor developing a crush on her as well, it almost seems like it's only worth it to redeem a reprogrammed ally (other than Rhinox) if they're a sexy lady tech expert who's dating one of their own.
- Later on in Beast Machines, Blackarachnia would attack Rattrap and call him a traitor when he made a weapons deal with Megatron, despite being a former Predacon herself and having an opportunity to reach out to Rattrap and understand what drove him to such lengths. She also forcibly changes Jetstorm back into Silverbolt despite expecting characters like Silverbolt and Optimus to give her the chance to make her own choices. Given all the things that have happened and will happen in the sequel series, Blackarachnia in the third season of Beast Wars can come off as less of a sympathetic Anti-Heroine trying to find her place in life and more of a whiny, entitled hypocrite who's not willing to extend to others the same chances and opportunities based on free will and individual sovereignty that she expects to receive herself.
Ben 10: Omniverse
- Ben Tennyson's egotism and immaturity had already started to get on the fans' nerves in season 3 of Alien Force and Ultimate Alien, but this was still somewhat balanced by him acting intelligent and selfless on occasion. But with his Flanderization getting to the point where he takes next to nothing seriously, acts incredibly stupid and seems to care more about having fun than actually helping people, many consider he has become downright unlikable to the point that fans prefer to root for whatever enemy is fighting Ben, even Vilgax himself.
- Azmuth to a lesser extent. He is supposedly this wise and benevolent ruler of Galvanic Prime, but it is repeatedly shown that he can be as much of a jerk as Ben. A prime example is the Duel of the Duplicates arc when he punishes Albedo by permanently trapping him in the form of 11-year-old Ben. While Albedo was clearly meant to deserve that, many fans saw that as a needlessly petty Kick Them While They Are Down moment, especially as one of the reasons for Albedo's Start of Darkness was being fed up by Azmuth's treatment of him.
- Blukic and Driba to many fans. The many problems they cause by acting stupid and irresponsible don't exactly make them come off as charming, and their comments on Cerebrocrustaceans' intelligence come off as flat out racist. The two of them being Creator's Pets do not help.
Blood of Zeus: The series tries to portray Zeus as a flawed but sympathetic character who while not immune to hypocrisy, later attempts to atone for his mistakes and actions. However, many fans see him as getting off too easily for being a Jerkass instead. A lot of it boils down to feeling that Zeus did not really do much to make up for his mistakes, in addition to his constant infidelity toward Hera while also gaslighting her. It also doesn't help that fans who are familiar with the Greek myths couldn't separate this depiction of Zeus from the original where he's morally worse, something that the show glossed over.
Bluey:
- Chilli in "The Sleepover" — while she was in the right for trying to put Muffin to bed, she comes across as a bit rude for blaming Bluey for Muffin not being in bed, since while Bluey was trying to keep Muffin awake, she's still only a kid.
- Some viewers saw Bandit as unsympathetic in "Movies", since he didn't teach Bingo (who was being loud and later running around at the movies) how to be polite at the movies.
- Chilli in "Omelette" making Bandit eat a poorly-made omelette that Bingo helped to make, after taking a better omelette away from him and making him wait no less. While she did it because she felt bad for not letting Bingo help make the first omelette, it seems pretty cruel, especially since it happened on his birthday.
- "Ragdoll" has one for both Bandit and Wendy — Bandit takes back some money his daughters found lying around, which is fair enough since the money was actually his, but then he breaks his promise to take them for ice cream. Then, Wendy takes them for ice cream instead of Bandit, but the way she does so is by taking his keys and driving his car without permission.
- Calypso taking the typewriter from Bluey in "Typewriter" was meant to be just encouraging her imagination, but comes across as unsympathetic, since Calypso had no real reason to take the typewriter away, and learning to type is good for a kid Bluey's age since it promotes hand-eye coordination. Add that to the fact that Bluey can't read, so the typewriter might help her learn to read.
Brace Face: Sharon is often a victim of this. Sure, she's only a teenager who's still trying to figure out who she is and navigate social circles in school, but her sometimes overbearing sense of self-righteousness (such as her vegetarianism and views on animal rights) and desire to fit in can cause her to do and say some pretty questionable things.
- One particularly notable example is from the Grand Finale where Alden decides to rekindle his relationship with Sharon (having broken up early in season 2). Sharon is reluctant to do so at first, wondering what's to keep him from ending it again, apparently overlooking the fact that, the reason they broke up in the first place was because she was jealous of Alden (platonically) hanging out with another girl, and he couldn't deal with her trust issues. Instead, Sharon acts like the break-up was all his doing and Alden even says it "wasn't my best idea" with neither admitting that she was equally, if not more so, to blame for it.
Castlevania (2017):
- Carmilla while still an antagonist, the show does its best to give her a few Alas, Poor Villain moments. In her Dark and Troubled Past Carmilla was abused by her sire before she killed him and still has nightmares over his abuse and during her Motive Rant in Season 4 she reveals that other vampires refused to help them due to their gender. For some viewers this all failed to stir up sympathy, as not only did Carmilla explicitly allow herself to be turned into a vampire after her sire promised her the world but Carmilla’s Psychopathic Womanchild behaviour and patronising disrespect to even her own vampire sisters, makes her seem like a Straw Feminist and Big Bad Wannabe who is too craven and petty to be considered tragic. Carmilla can also be seen as hypocritical, as she derides the grief-induced insanity of Dracula yet doesn’t acknowledge how her own actions make her just as (if not even more) deranged.
- Lenore ultimately came off as this for some viewers. She’s treated as the Token Good Teammate among the four vampire sisters and is meant to be seen as the most sympathetic for the compassion she gives to Hector as well as briefly mentioning a tragic past where her parents were murdered. But her actions in Season 3 i.e manipulating Hector while he’s imprisoned, giving him a Disproportionate Retribution for trying to escape and then tricking Hector by slipping a soul binding ring on him while having sex with him so he’ll obey, comes off as too much of a Moral Event Horizon. In the Season 4 ending, having genuinely bonded with Hector (off-screen) she gives a token apology and is Easily Forgiven by the guy who needed to cut his own finger off to be free of her power. Some even found Lenore’s suicide viva sunlight unsympathetic since said she hates feeling trapped, yet was perfectly okay with her Love Interest being held captive by her for months.
- Saint Germain’s Freudian Excuse in Season 4 for his Face–Heel Turn came off as to some viewers. Having lost the unnamed adventurer woman he loves in the Infinite Corridor while time travelling, Germain makes a deal with the Alchemist (actually Death in disguise) that he’ll help bind Dracula and Lisa’s soul to Rebis and bring about the end of humanity for the sake of bringing her back. Unfortunately it isn’t made clear even in the flash backs whether or not the woman genuinely reciprocated his feelings and if she did, he lustily claims while carrying out his plan that if he succeeds he’ll “be able to have sex again” so a few viewers felt Germain was willing to trigger the apocalypse not for love, but just for the sake of getting laid. Granted he does switch sides at the last minute to rescue Trevor before dying.
In Code Lyoko, The gang's treatment towards Sissi becomes this once one sees the prequel episodes. While she has demonstrated many Alpha Bitch tendencies and has been quite nosy, it turns out it was actually her who found the factory and thus technically brought the gang together. Because she was too afraid to go into Lyoko and called authorities when XANA targeted her, the gang hit the reset button which also meant her memories of the factory were completely wiped. Essentially? The gang's distrust of her stems from events that never happened thanks to the limited Time Travel. What also doesn't help is that Sissi's actions in the prequel were ''entirely' reasonable. She was afraid to go into a virtual world over concerns of safety, and she contacted authorities because Lyoko is Not a Game.
Danny Phantom:
- In "Double Cross My Heart," a mysterious newcomer named Gregor shows interest in Sam Manson, while the hero Danny is suspicious of him, thinking he may be working for the Guys in White. Sam calls him out for being suspicious and spying on them and yells at him, but this completely neglects that a) she did the same thing in the previous episode and received no criticism for it, b) this had happened before to someone else (Danny's sister Jazz) and her life was at stake, and c) Danny ended up being right for the wrong reasons (Gregor wasn't a bad guy, just an egotistical brat pretending to be someone he wasn't). Unlike when Sam spied on Danny, Danny actually had a legitimate reason to spy on them: they knew nothing about Gregor so he may very well have been a spy, he just didn't know he was jealous at the time. Sam spied on him solely out of jealousy. And while Danny apologizes for the act, Sam doesn't apologize for snapping at him. Rather, we're meant to sympathize with her because she can only get a boyfriend if he's a phony.
  - As a matter of fact, there are a lot of examples of this involving Sam throughout the series. While she does have her positive moments, such as calling out Danny and Tucker for thinking she can't play video games because she's a girl, or admitting she keeps her family's wealth a secret so she can have real friends, it can be hard to see her as sympathetic when she does things like enter and win a beauty pageant only to proclaim it's stupid in front of all the girls who actually wanted to win, or trying to show off her individuality as an "ultra-recyclo vegetarian" by forcing everyone else at school to eat what is essentially grass on a bun (and this was the first episode).
- Everyone in "King Tuck":
  - Tucker is ignored by everyone while trying to run for class president. Even Danny and Sam are ignorant to their friend's plight.
  - Sometime later, Tucker gets back at everyone while under the influence of an ancient Egyptian artifact, but he isn't immune to this when he orders an attack on Danny, who was trying to save everyone, including him.
Dee Dee from Dexter's Laboratory sometimes slips into this territory, Depending on the Writer. The total disregard she shows for Dexter's lab and even for Dexter himself at times makes Dexter's actions unintentionally cathartic to the viewers, especially since a lot of those instances were justified/well-deserved retaliations for something she did.
The infamous Dinosaur Adventure has several. One of them is Cree the pterodactyl. His relationship with Tio the baby T-Rex is supposed to be sweet and cute. Instead, Cree comes off more like an irresponsible jerk than a close friend.
Donkey Kong Country: In "Kong for a Day", all of DK's friends engage in Disproportionate Retribution against him after King K. Rool frames him for things like losing Funky's surfboard and leaving a banana peel that Candy slips on. At worst, these were harmless pranks and annoyances. As punishment for this, they strip him of his title and banish him. We are supposed to sympathize with them because they don't know he's been framed, but even if he had been guilty of those things, their punishment for him would still be way too excessive.
Three notable examples from The Dragon Prince:
- King Harrow in the episode "Moonrise", where he gives Viren a "The Reason You Suck" Speech that viewers feel was uncalled for. Given that, for all of Viren's "unconventional solutions", Harrow is implied to have taken part in them, it feels almost like he's trying to place all the guilt onto Viren — someone who stood by his side all his life and was implied to have been willing to commit a Heroic Sacrifice to save his life.
  - Worse yet, years ago we found out that Harrow knowingly starved his own people to feed another kingdom. Viren came up with a plan to get a magma titan's heart to fuel a spell that would save both the kingdoms. Viren once again urged King Harrow to leave the wounded behind so they could get the heart quickly over the border (or at least let General Amaya and the other wounded hide from Thunder during the day, and then catch up with them after nightfall), but King Harrow stubbornly refused to leave any of the wounded behind. Predictably, carrying the wounded slowed everyone down, and Thunder caught them on his land before they could all safely cross the border, forcing the two queens and Sarai to perform heroic sacrifices to save everyone. causing Harrow to blame Viren and his dark magic which ultimately led to the rift they had at the start of the series and Harrow punishing Viren. Again, if King Harrow had not acted that way, Viren would not have been the villain. Anyone who was killed by Viren or otherwise suffered from damage caused by him also has King Harrow to blame. Designated Hero anybody?
  - Likewise, the scene of when he and Viren go to kill Thunder. Harrow is convinced by Viren that the spear is a good idea so Sarai's death won't be in vain. Thunder tells them he's not in a killing mood and will let them leave in peace, but Harrow and Viren attack anyway, and Viren goes to destroy the dragon egg. Harrow protests for a moment but gives into Viren's logic that the Dragon Prince will perpetuate the Cycle of Revenge. While months later Harrow regrets what he did, thinking Viren destroyed the egg, his response is a Last Stand battle and blaming Viren rather than making amends the way Callum and Ezran do. Callum himself feels guilty when he sees Thunder's corpse, even though he had nothing to do with it.
- The Queens themselves are supposed to be seen as heroic women committing heroic sacrifices for their people, but the whole reason they have soldiers with them is so they don't end up dead on their mission. There was no reason for them to die except misplaced heroism. Their deaths cause great harm to their daughter, who was ruled over by regents who often tried to assassinate her, making her have to grow up much too soon.
- General Amaya also has such a moment. She attacks Rayla behind and without warning, showing clear murder intentions. There was not the slightest evidence that Rayla really had any malicious intent, apart from the fact that her orphaned nephews are in the lodge and it's an odd coincidence that a Moon elf is there. Amaya does not kill Rayla only due to that, because Commander Gren enters the room just in this time to tell her that the two princes can not be found. In their case, it borders on Strawman Has a Point, because King Harrow was murdered only a few days earlier by elven assassins, and Rayla was among them. In addition, Rayla is clearly not a civilian but wears the clothes of an assassin. For the viewers, this scene is still quite savage, because they have already met Rayla as a lovable dork. Season 3 fixes this when Amaya helps the Sunfire elves after being captured and seeing Viren assassinate their leader. She bonds with Janai and learns that not all elves are evil. When she reunites with her nephew, Callum sheepishly apologizes for lying that Rayla kidnapped him and Ezran. Amaya forgives him and treats Rayla as an ally.
The Land of Dreams in The Dreamstone on occasion. We are meant to side with the heroes because Zordrak and the Urpneys keep trying to give them nightmares. Except that the Urpneys are Zordrak's Slave Mooks who get tortured or executed if they don't follow orders. The heroes resultantly look Wangsty and petty, especially in cases their retribution gets particularly excessive. That they could rarely back it up whenever the villains really were dangerous didn't help. Later episodes at least fixed their characterizations and gave them proper mortal stakes, though they still had Frizz and Nug as their main provocateurs.
Ed, Edd n Eddy:
- Kevin was this in "This Won't Hurt an Ed". The viewer is supposed to feel sorry for him because Eddy keeps exploiting his fear of needles. However, when you consider Kevin's constant and often unwarranted antagonizing of Eddy in previous episodes (including one of his most infamous Kick the Dog moments in "Your Ed Here"), it seems more like well-deserved revenge on Eddy's part.
- In "Tinker Ed", we're meant to feel sorry for Jimmy because Kevin gives him a Breaking Speech about how fairy tales aren't real, driving Jimmy into a depression that lasts nearly the whole episode. But maybe if Jimmy wasn't running around the library shrieking at the top of his lungs and generally being a childish pain in the ass while Kevin was trying to study, he wouldn't have gotten yelled at in the first place.
Final Space: In the first season's backstory, Gary was imprisoned aboard the Galaxy One for causing mass property damage in one fell swoop while he was trying to show off to a woman he'd just met, and during the five years he's been alone on the otherwise-empty prison ship with only a couple robots for company, he's sent a video diary addressed to said woman every single day. The show plays the latter as if it's something heartwarming when Quinn finds out about it and is touched, but for many viewers, Gary's behavior instead comes across as incredibly creepy and obsessive stalking, especially since he'd barely known Quinn at all when he'd been put away.
Futurama:
- Yivo from The Beast With A Billion Backs. While shklee's obviously the main antagonist of the movie, shklee's still portrayed as not actually villainous or evil, despite forcing almost everyone in the universe into a relationship with him by forcibly putting his tentacles into people's necks. And then he was revealed to explicitly be "mating" with those people through those tentacles, but was only treated like someone moving through a relationship too fast. All the characters (except for the robots) eventually accept him as a valid relationship despite this, with going to live with him being called Heaven, even. The only reason he breaks things off is because it turns out Fry was still communicating with Bender, cementing Yivo as a Crazy Jealous Guy too immature for the relationship he pushed onto the main characters on top of everything else. Watching Bender drag Yivo's "Heaven" down to Earth with The Legions of (Robot) Hell and verbally deconstruct his idea of love was extremely satisfying, even if it was meant to show Bender being at his most selfish.
- Colleen, Fry's one-time girlfriend, from the same movie. She is presented as someone who Fry can finally be in a stable and happy relationship with......only to find out she is in relationships with four other men who all live together in the same apartment. While we're supposed to feel bad for her after Fry dumps her and siding with her when she calls out Fry for letting his position as 'tentacle-pope' inflate his ego, Colleen actually comes across as a self-centered, domineering bitch if you look at the film more closely. Her 'five boyfriends' thing is more akin to how some Middle-Eastern cultures allow men to have multiple wives, and these polygamous marriages are all too often domineering and even outright abusive. This is clearly the case here, with her being the dominant partner and the center of attention. Not to mention the thing that made Fry break up with her was because she was going on a date with another man outside of the five she already had relationships with. Also, her "Reason You Suck" Speech speech to Fry reveals that she is not at all satisfied with just one man and wants to date multiple men of different races, cultures and backgrounds, which may have been intended as just an unorthodox sexuality, but sounds more like the actions of a self-centered nymphomaniac and hedonist. Then there is the fact that she leaves her universe to be with Yivo of all people, abandoning her relationships on Earth and marrying Yivo, who as above is stated to be just as bad.
- Philip J. Fry in "Game of Tones". His desire to spend time with a dream simulation of his deceased mother is totally understandable... except that by doing so, he's willfully ignoring his mission and jeopardizing every actual living person on Earth.

G-M

Oberon from Gargoyles may have never been intended to be a particularly sympathetic character to begin with, but he comes across as such a conceited, impulsive dick that he was viewed by many fans in a much more negative light than the creators intended for him to be seen, to the point that Greg Weisman had to defend and explain Oberon's actions in the episode "The Gathering". Said explanation being that Oberon felt leaving Alex with humans would be the same as crippling him comes across as very racist.
Gravity Falls:
- Mabel Pines is narratively depicted as an All-Loving Hero and Nice Girl, but she's had enough Innocently Insensitive and All Take and No Give moments that some viewers questioned her kindness. The latter is brought into the spotlight in "Sock Opera", where Bill exploits Dipper's determination and gives Mabel a Jerkass Realization that didn't quite stick. This left some fans feeling that her later unknowing Deal with the Devil in "Dipper and Mabel vs. the Future" to freeze Gravity Falls in time to prevent people and situations around her from changing in ways that upset her was a continuation of the flaws she never grew out of as opposed to a Moment of Weakness. After getting put in a magic bubble prison designed to mimic her idea of a perfect world, which shielded her and only her from the horrifying consequences of her actions, she only leaves once Dipper promises to rescind his acceptance of Ford's apprenticeship in order to stay with her as she wishes. From critics' perspective, this writing choice to appease Mabel's selfishness at Dipper's expense, rather than confront and address the underlying character flaws that caused the conflict, further cast into doubt whether Mabel actually earned the resolution she was given or even truly cared about the effect of her flaws on others enough to change. Gravity Falls: Lost Legends addresses the latter with an Author's Saving Throw, where after Weirdmageddon, she nearly gets stuck on a planet with other lost Mabels, admits to them that she "caused an entire apocalypse just to get one more day of summer" and promises to never be selfish again if she can get back to her dimension, and apologizes to Dipper for being self-centered during their summer vacation. However, this fell flat to some fans on the basis that she otherwise faced no consequences for doing so and still got what she wanted (Dipper going home with her) in the end.
- The girls in "Roadside Attraction" are supposed to be justifiably upset with Dipper for flirting with multiple girls behind their backs in an allegory for infidelity. But each girl only had one simple, non-romantic interaction with him, gave Dipper their numbers to keep in touch, and really had no expectations of ever seeing him again, making this reaction come off as grossly excessive. Mabel angrily calling Dipper "Betrayer!" when he tries to apologize comes off as hypocritical, not only because her Establishing Character Moment of the pilot is her aggressively flirting with multiple guys and because of her multiple simultaneous crushes throughout the series, but also because as she had previously made Dipper a list of possible rebound crushes. Candy's more justifiable anger due to her crush on Dipper is hurt by her failure to see how clearly uncomfortable Dipper was with her very forward advances. The episode ends with the most socially anxious member of the cast being shamed into apologizing for 1). attempting to follow the rest of the cast's encouragement and try to be more social, and 2). others' misunderstandings and mistakes. The result reads more as a warped lesson against guys interacting with girls, which comes off as sexist against both genders due to effectively saying that guys should be expected to take responsibility for things that aren't their fault and girls simply can't be reasoned with.
- Blendin Blandin loses his career with the Time Police and gets arrested due to causing the time anomalies he was supposed to fix because of Dipper and Mabel "borrowing" his Time Machine. But this happened because Blendin was bad at his job; failing to stay hidden, easily tricked into removing his time machine, causing the anomalies trying to get it back. When Dipper and Mabel learn what happened, they feel sorry for Blendin and make the Time Police give him another chance, with which he's tricked by Bill Cipher into helping bring Weirdmageddon. Gravity Falls: Journal 3 reveals this was due to the Time Police taunting him which he was promised would stop, but Blendin ultimately brought much of this upon himself with his ineptitude and bad judgement.
The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy:
- There are plenty of episodes where something happens that affects Mandy and, as a result, we're supposed to see her as sympathetic. The problem here is that she's the Token Evil Teammate of the main protagonists and gets away with doing some absolutely despicable things. Some of the supposedly bad things that happen to her are a result of her being evil, and usually, she still wins. So, when something happens and she legitimately suffers, it's less "the main protagonist is having a hard time and you should feel bad for her" and more "this little douchebag is finally getting her comeuppance for once". It also tends to result in making characters like Grim, Billy, and Irwin Unintentionally Sympathetic, since some of these situations are intended to have us side against them, but that's hard to do seeing how bad Mandy is and how she treats them when they aren't the bad guys.
- Billy and Grim come off as less sympathetic than they were meant to be in the episode "Sickly Sweet". Their intention is to use the Mask of the Beast (which turns whoever wears it into a hideous beast unless the person becomes nicer) on Mandy as payback for all the times she pushed them around, which is honestly understandable. However, even with their warning her that being hostile would worsen the effects of the mask transforming her into a beast, their decision to destroy the cookies they asked her to make and to try and force her to give them a sponge bath was going too far. These actions of theirs would more likely persuade the audience to cheer when Mandy decides that putting up with their crap isn't worth preventing her transformation into a beast and proceeds to beat the daylights out of Billy and Grim.
Towards the end of the House of Mouse episode, "Mickey Vs. Shelby", Donald glues Baby Shelby to the stage so he can't run away from him or Mickey anymore. As it is time for him to perform, Shelby gets stage fright in front of the guests at the House of Mouse. The audience is expected to feel sorry for Shelby and see the following moment, wherein Mickey performs with him, as a heartwarming moment. The problem is, Shelby has done nothing other than run away from, tease, and torture Mickey and especially Donald throughout the episode; not just in the wraparounds, but also both the Mickey Mouse Works shorts.
Infinity Train:
- One-One can come across as this in "The Beach Car", as we're supposed to think of him as a good friend to Tulip and are supposed to feel sorry for him when she gives him away to the Cat. Even though his "advice" made her think she's going to die on the train and his attempts at being a good friend feel more like he's trying to guilt-trip her. While he is friendly towards Tulip and they both have the same goal, the Cat was (seemingly) trying to help Tulip getting off the train and never indicated that she's planning to harm One-One. Besides that, Tulip and One-One were familiar with each other for a few days at most.
- As of Season 2 and "The Mall Car", Amelia is now heading towards this direction. While yes, her losing Alrick is horrible and she was in a state of mourning, that does not forgive the fact that her usurping One-One as the Conductor means that people are fumbling in the dark trying to figure out how to get off the train and has now led teens and numerous kids to see her as a god, equate bigger numbers as a sign of status and committ violence in her name. It gets worse as Amelia doesn't feel the least bit sorry as to what she caused others to cause, doesn't even remember "saving" Grace (the leader of the her worshippers) all those years ago and tears Grace's second in command, Simon's reality into confetti, without doing anything to confine this dangerous youth for both the safety of himself and others. It doesn't help Amelia was always mentally stable and her background makes her come across as privileged and Wangsty, whilst Grace and Simon had much worse backgrounds as well as severe instability for Simon, making them less morally culpable.
Invincible (2021):
- Amber in relation to her being revealed to have figured out Mark was a superhero, a couple weeks before he told her. Some viewers felt as though this made some of her complaints about Mark ditching her and lying unfair because for the last couple of weeks she knew that he was out risking his life trying to save innocent people, and that she was hypocritical for being a Secret Secret-Keeper herself.
- Mark during episode six for some. At this point some viewers were sick of him still stringing along Amber, as well as the fact that his refusing to take his own frightened best friend seriously and ignoring William's concerns, led to an already bad situation for Rick going even worse than it might otherwise have. On the other hand, this could easily be chalked up to Mark just learning to get used to his life as a new superhero and trying to figure out who to trust with his secret.
- Eve during episode 7, when Mark goes to her for comfort and advice as the one friend who can understand his problems. Like William, Eve doesn’t console Mark at all just criticizes him saying he should’ve been honest with Amber and shouldn’t have “dicked her around”. For some this came off as cruel, as Eve herself is experiencing similar grief in her own home life and she’s also one to talk about honestly given her own feelings for Mark which she keeps to herself.
I Yabba-Dabba-Doo has Pebbles. Bam-Bam writes a poem for her but the moment she reads "Dear Pebbles", she assumes it's a "Dear John" Letter and ends it until Bam-Bam stops her and shows her the rest. Later, Bam-Bam jokes about her father being a cheapskate, and Pebbles turns it into a one-sided argument, with Bam-Bam keeping a cool head and trying to calm her down. She breaks it off again and tells her family that they fought about everything. In the end, it's Bam-Bam, not Pebbles, who apologizes.
Jem:
- Jerrica can come off as a two-faced bitch who hides it under a facade. For example, when she meets The Misfits she outright calls them "trash" when they did little to her besides being a bit rude and arrogant. She also flirts with and kisses her boyfriend as Jem despite the fact he is utterly clueless about them being the same person.
- We're meant to at least somewhat sympathize with Pizzazz's father; however, most Misfits fans can't. We're supposed to see him as a father who had difficulties taking care of his daughter after his wife left, being unable to deal with Pizzazz's behavior and also being overworked. Instead he comes off as neglectful and the source of most of her issues. He didn't show her enough affection and thus she now tries to get the attention she lacked as a child by being the top rock group out there, which is why she gets so mad that Jem is more popular. Pizzazz's father doesn't want Pizzazz bothering him when it's obvious she just wants attention from him,
- Rio is supposed to be Jerrica's lovable boyfriend. Unfortunately, there are some aspects of his character that undermine this. He's a Crazy Jealous Guy who gets mad easily. He's in love with Jerrica but also has an affair with Jem and this is treated in a lighthearted manner, despite this making him come across as a complete hypocrite due to him saying that he despises liars early on in the series. It's hard to see why Jerrica is so hung up on him. His IDW comics version is seen in a far more favorable light as he isn't so jealous, is more mellow, and doesn't cheat.
- The Misfits themselves undergo a clumsy Heel–Face Turn at the end of the show despite spending most of it endangering lives including one instance when they kidnapped Jerrica's sister Kimber and left her in a volcano. ^note Word of God says it was only a temporary truce; however, that doesn't stop it from being awkward.
Justice League: Word of God has stated that Project Cadmus, the anti-Justice League government think tank in the third season, were supposed to be sympathetic Anti Villains with a strong point about the dangers of unrestricted superhumans. In fact, the writers found Cadmus so sympathetic that they introduced a Conflict Killer in the form of Brainiac so he could be revealed as having been manipulating both sides to avoid having to paint either Cadmus or the League as in the wrong. Fans, on the other hand, overwhelmingly sided with the League, considering Cadmus's deeds included attempting to nuke an inhabited island simply to kill Superman and Doomsday, creating Doomsday to begin with, manufacturing an army of cloned Slave Mooks and sending them to massacre the League (including the completely innocent Watchtower staff), and teaming up with supervillains including Lex Luthor, all before the League had done much of anything to them. In the end, pretty much the only thing fans actually agreed with Cadmus on was them being outraged by the League's Watchtower secretly having a laser with the power of a nuclear bomb aimed at the planet.
King of the Hill:
- Hank Hill slips into this territory, particularly in the later seasons. The audience is supposed to sympathize with how he feels about anything new, untraditional, or otherwise out of his comfort zone. But it's difficult to take that in when most of the people who are "against" him are straw stereotypes, the show goes to ridiculous lengths to make him the Only Sane Man by Flanderizing most of the recurring cast, and how he starts narrowing down what he finds an "acceptable" lifestyle to his son Bobby until he will nearly-only accept it if Bobby becomes just like him. The fact that the show ends not with Hank finally accepting Bobby for who he is (again) but instead with Bobby turning out to have a talent related to Hank's interests does not help matters at all.
- Bill. He has been through a bad divorce and is the show's regular Butt-Monkey, except that his emotional attachment can sometimes border on creepy levels. Especially how he's implied to be stalking Peggy on more than one occasion. This reaches its peak when he's put in charge of a flood shelter: he goes mad with power, puts the blame on Hank (who, by contrast, has been acting as a reasonable and responsible shelter leader the entire time) before locking him up, allows the people inside to waste supplies, and was even implied to keep everyone in after the flood ended. On top of that, he pulls a Karma Houdini and ends up being seen as a hero by almost everyone involved. The one time where it seems like his leading methods are going to backfire on him, where everyone complains that they ran out of cinnamon sticky buns, he simply blames Hank for eating them all and everything's fine again. The reason why he's supposed to be sympathetic is because he got to be a respected leader once in his life, but his selfishness and carelessness throughout the episode makes it hard to feel sorry for him.
  - Bill's affair with Reverend Stroup ends with much the same result. Even though she genuinely cared for Bill enough to step down from Arlen Methodist just to be with him and it seemed as if he'd finally found love, Bill dumps her because without the Forbidden Fruit aspect of the relationship, he found it boring. It's hard to feel sorry for him constantly whining about how lonely he is from there on when he had a shot at happiness with a good woman, and he threw it away for an incredibly selfish and stupid reason.
- Even Dale Gribble occasionally qualifies. He's an acknowledged Cloud Cuckoolander, but the show treats his relationship with Nancy and Joseph as his saving grace. He undoubtedly loves them, but considering both the sheer amount of crap he subjects Nancy to and the fact that his "raising" Joseph involves either spoiling him rotten or setting a terrible example ("Vision Quest", for one), his intended Pet the Dog moments often fall flat. When John Redcorn (Joseph's biological father) basically tells Nancy that he can't trust Dale to raise Joseph, it's hard to argue.
Some characters from Looney Tunes could sometimes fall victim to this (not that it made them any less funny, of course):
- "Canned Feud": It might come off as a surprise to learn we're actually supposed to root for the mouse that pointlessly torments Sylvester left and right (with the intent of starving him to death no less). Even worse, Sylvester had no intention of hurting him.
  - The character, referred to as Brownie Mouse by some sources, appeared in several other Sylvester shorts, most of them only nominally better than the above. Brownie was essentially Jerry at his worst with the negative aspects punctuated, being a smug little vermin who had nothing against taking his offense above and beyond self defense or even, as in "Canned Feud", just skipping the "he started it" mentality altogether. He even got away with tormenting Bugs Bunny in "Rhapsody Rabbit".
- Also "Gonzales Tomales" where, angered by Speedy stealing their girls, the male mice trick Sylvester into thinking he's called him out for a fight. Sylvester dares him to just try it, upon which he gladly beats him to a pulp. Sylvester, the supposed villain of the story, was the only sympathetic character of the bunch (among Speedy's homewrecker tendencies and the rest of the mouse population resorting to murderous measures of revenge), yet still ended up the sole loser.
  - "Mexican Cat Dance": Speedy, despite being the supposed "good guy" in this cartoon, is little more than a bully, constantly tormenting and humiliating Sylvester for no reason other than sheer entertainment.
- "Long-Haired Hare": While nobody would argue that Giovanni Jones is anything more than a violent hot-head and pompous Jerkass, the rather extreme measures Bugs Bunny takes to exact revenge on him (with the ending bordering on murder) make it very hard to root for him.
  - In fact, this trope is what led to the creation of Yosemite Sam. Elmer Fudd was so pathetic that Bugs came off as a mean-spirited bully in some shorts featuring the two, so the animators needed an even bigger and more belligerent Jerkass to be Bugs' victim.
  - Early Bugs Bunny shorts are even worse, where Bugs is a troll tormenting others, who aren't trying to even hurt him, seemingly for his own amusement. "Wabbit Twouble" and "Elmer's Pet Rabbit" are pretty bad in this regard. Directors made restraints on the character afterwards, making clear he couldn't attack without being victimized first (though to what degree varied).
- According to Chuck Jones, Wile E. Coyote is always meant to be an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain. Too bad that there is a number of people who don't feel that way.
Porky Pig in the The Looney Tunes Show episode "French Fries". Yes, Daffy is being an asshole by making a big deal over Porky eating some of his fries (just after Porky had invited them to watch a football game no less), and Porky is rightfully angry at Daffy when he takes it too far, but he also begins snapping at Bugs for supposedly taking Daffy's side when he's the one trying to keep the peace. Eventually, Bugs buys the two gift baskets to convince them to make up. However, the truth comes out and Porky rips up all three of the football tickets out of pure spite, even though Bugs had done nothing wrong.
Masters of the Universe: Revelation: Teela and King Randor's anger towards Adam for being kept in the dark with his dual identity comes off as this. Considering not only have they constantly been pretty hard on poor Adam^note, but also the fact that the secret wasn't exactly his to tell, being under strict orders from the Sorceress herself to not let anyone else know about his power, lest Skeletor learn the truth about Grayskull and he would lose the protection.
Mr. Men and Little Miss: It can very hard to feel bad for Little Miss Somersault in "A Rival For Little Miss Somersault" when Little Miss Magic makes her less nimble to teach her a lesson and ends up suffering a Humiliation Conga, due to the fact that, prior to the whole thing, she had been showing off and called Little Miss Splendid, Little Miss Greedy and Mr. Lazy "Hopeless" for not being able to somersault properly and, after getting her ability to somersault back, she gives Little Miss Shy a less then sincere apology after scaring the crap out of her by jumping over her in a queue. Little Miss Splendid, Little Miss Greedy and Mr. Lazy laughing at her for failing to do a somersault can come off as more of a retaliation instead of them laughing at someone's misfortune.
My Adventures with Superman: Lois comes off as this to some fans. While Lois hates it when people lie to her and has a good justification through her father lying about how sick her mother was before she died, at the same time, she doesn't have a problem with lying to get what she wants, like how she lied to Clark and Jimmy on their first day and almost got them fired or when she made them impersonate the Scoop Troop for a story. Lois' What the Hell, Hero? treatment of Clark after confirming that he lied about being Superman takes this even further as while it makes sense for Lois to be mad, Clark had reasons for not wanting to tell her that she simply ignores, and by the time the conflict is resolved, she never apologizes for giving him a hard time. The pacing of the series is largely at fault for this, as Lois' anger is meant to be more understandable because she has romantic feelings for Clark, but as this is only the fifth episode it doesn't feel like Clark and Lois have had enough time to develop deeper feelings for one another beyond friendship, and the show expects the audience to just accept it as a given simply because they're Clark Kent and Lois Lane, a famous romantic pairing across all sorts of other media.
- Episode 6 "My Adventures with Mad Science" does try to add more nuance to Lois' perspective, but the results are mixed. On the one hand, Lois clarifies that part of the reason she's so pissed at Clark for lying about being Superman is because it throws everything else he's said into doubt, including whether his feelings for her are genuine. On the other hand, when Jimmy reveals that he'd known about Clark's secret identity for a long time and reasonably says that he never brought it up because it was Clark's business if he ever wanted to tell him, Lois's immediate reaction is to ask why Jimmy never told her.

N-Z

Ninjago: Harumi suffered a huge Trauma Conga Line after losing her parents in the Great Devourer's attack on Ninjago, and the Ninja's failure to stop such a tragedy, as well as Lord Garmadon being the one to kill the Devourer directly, all inspire her to become evil as well. The story tries to paint her as a Tragic Villain who becomes conflicted and isn't beyond redemption, as shown when she goes out of her way to prevent the same tragedy she suffered from happening to another family at the cost of her life, as well as hint that she had genuinely fallen in love with Lloyd after all. The problem is that Harumi still remorselessly committed so many atrocities and her relationship with Lloyd also comes off as toxic considering how she strung him along and subjected him to Kick the Dog time and again, especially when she gloats about how Garmadon now cares for her over him. When Lloyd points out that Garmadon's tyrannical rule would likely rob children of their families and make them suffer the same loss she went through, Harumi didn't care, making her Redemption Equals Death come off as forced. And even that's negated when she's resurrected as the Overlord's herald and she continues to be evil, only turning on him when the Overlord reveals he corrupted the Great Devourer and indirectly caused her parents' deaths. All of this makes Harumi comes off as less than a sympathetic figure, and more of a bratty child who idolizes evil.
The Penguins of Madagascar:
- The penguins see absolutely no issue with stealing food from humans, which isn't a big issue, except that sometimes they go overboard and steal full food carts with no consideration that this would mean those persons would lose their jobs or chances on making money.
- The Penguins at the end of "Operation: Neighbor Swap" where they ditch Roger for spending too much time in their habitat... because they were the ones that put him without asking in a habitat that's not accommodated to his needs.
The Powerpuff Girls (1998):
- Elmer Sglue from "Paste Makes Waste". While the other kids had no right to bully him, he rampages through the entire city after becoming a giant paste monster and attacks people who hadn't done anything to him, even tearing up a few buildings and using them as bowling pins. It's not even a case of him going berserk — he was in complete control of his actions the entire time and could have stopped whenever he felt like it. His attacking Miss Keane and trying to suffocate Blossom and Bubbles are particularly heinous acts since they had tried to stop the bullies from picking on him.
- Blossom and Bubbles in "Cover Up". The episode attempts to show them as in the right, but they shamelessly pick on Buttercup for her having a Security Blanket, even Bubbles, who has an emotional crutch of her own, Octi the octopus. At the end, they even force Buttercup to give up her blanket.
The Proud Family:
- Penny's friends in "A Star Is Scorned". To elaborate, Penny decides to go solo and dump her friends after LPDZ becomes famous, until she realizes she misses her old life and quits. While this episode was obviously trying to give an aesop about how it's not nice to dump your friends for fame, fans of the show found it hard to sympathize with Penny's friends due to how fake they can be towards her as Suga Mama points out. Dijonay even admits at the end that if it was her she wouldn’t have given up her fame and money.
- LaCienega in "Love Thy Neighbor". While it was cruel for the other kids and teacher to laugh at her big feet during the swim test scene, LaCienega is too much of a jerkass to be seen as sympathetic since she's always cruel to others and she continued to whine and cry about it long after everyone else moved on, making her come across as wangsty. Had it been anyone else being bullied for a similar reason, she more than likely would've joined in.
- Oscar and the other parents get this for kicking their kids out of the house for refusing to do their chores unless they receive a higher allowance. Besides the fact that kids can't earn money— Zoey gets fired from being a movie theater usher when it turns out she lied about her age— it's basically child abuse. Also, Oscar waits until Penny is worn down from marching alone and screaming at the top of her lungs for hours before he bribes her to come home with homemade gumbo, and promising to listen to her. And he was the only parent that compromised; everyone else accepted their kids and the status quo while Penny got ten dollars. It also doesn't help that the beginning of the episode revealed Oscar used Penny to do all the stuff Trudy asked him to do, like changing the oil in the car. Not only did Penny only receive five dollars after working her ass off for the entire day, Trudy actually agreed with Oscar that Penny should only get five dollars.
- Suga Mama herself - considering her treatment towards Oscar as The Unfavorite (see Strawman Has a Point), Oscar is well within his rights to want nothing to do with her.
- Even Trudy has her own moments of this - in one episode, Penny has a broken leg and Suga Mama has a revoked driver's license. When Trudy has to drive Suga Mama around while taking care of bedridden Penny, she snaps - and even tells Oscar that while she can handle "Your daughter", she can't handle "your mother" at the same time. While being stressed is understandable, this is one of only two times Suga Mama is ever called out on her behaviour, and instead gives the impression Trudy is just fine with Suga Mama [[as long as Suga Mama isn't bothering her.
The Proud Family: Louder and Prouder:
- Miss Hill in "Home School." While it's sad that she's homeless and later fired and kicked out of school, that's no excuse for the way she treats her students. The Prouds were kind enough to let Miss Hill stay at their house, and she repays them by essentially taking over the household, forcing them to behave like students, and physically abusing them, including Trudy who did nothing to deserve it.
- Melrose in "Raging Bully". She went through a divorce some time before the episode took place, and that's usually painful but is no excuse for taking it out on everyone, especially LaBrea, who went as far as stuffing herself into three corsets because her mother wouldn't let her attend LaCienega's Quince if she wasn't skinnier than her cousin, whom she almost killed.
- The episode "The End of Innocence" is meant to explore colorism, with the audience meant to sympathize with LaCienega, Dijonay, Maya, and Michael when a celebrity crush named Noah asks Zoey out on a date to the Valentine's Day dance, presumably overlooking them because he only prefers white girls. However, most viewers ultimately feel bad for Zoey, due to them taking their frustration out on her throughout the entire episode and ostracizing her from the friend group, despite Zoey having zero control over what kind of girls this guy likes and the whole thing just being an unconfirmed rumor. It doesn't help that the only attempt at explaining the situation to Zoey comes across as them implying that no attractive guy would ever be interested in Zoey for any reason beyond her skin color (despite there being other white girls actively fawning over him in the same scene he asked Zoey out). It doesn't help that Penny and Dijonay already have boyfriends (who were in the room, no less) yet the story is trying to make us feel bad that their advances at the start of the episode were rejected.
The Real Ghostbusters:
- Jeremy, the villain of "Ragnarok and Roll", is meant to be an Anti-Villain because he sees the error of his ways and he did evil because he was sad. Yet the reason for his sadness was just because his girlfriend turned down his proposal (and didn't even say she never wanted to marry him; just that she was unready) and the thing he wanted to do was cause The End of the World as We Know It.
- Peter, Ray, and Winston in "'Til Death Do Us Part" were among the protagonists of the episode, and they do later do good when they help save Egon, but initially they come across as sexist (for hiring an attractive Dumb Blonde as temporary secretary instead of a frumpy, but competent, woman) and ageist (since it's implied part of the reason they turned down Mrs. Attlemeyer, the other woman they interviewed, was because she was old).
In Recess, the episode "Nobody Doesn't Like TJ" tries to give the Hard Truth Aesop that you can't please everyone - not everyone will be your friend or even a frienemy (like Lawson). After several failed attempts to befriend Gordy, TJ decides to get them both in trouble so he can try and bond with him one on one. Unfortunately, Gordy still doesn't like TJ, which is fine... expect the message is ultimately that someone make dislike you for no reason at all, since Gordy is unable to give a single reason why. This is despite the episode actually giving several legitimate reasons why Gordy and TJ are incompatible: TJ being obsequious, accidentally triggering a nut allergy, annoying him, not even apologising, etc.
The sheer unlikeability of Candy Smalls, the protagonist of Santa Inc., contributes massively to the show's Too Bleak, Stopped Caring reception. It's hard to root for her quest to become the next Santa Claus because, in addition to her being rude, conceited, selfish, obnoxious and entitled, it's made very clear by her behavior and comments that pursuing the role is purely an ego trip for her and all her commentary about "breaking the glass ceiling" is just empty justifications. She's even shown to be a Child Hater, which makes her a terrible fit for the role given how much Santa Claus' job is to interact with kids. Thus, when the current Santa tells her he will not give her the role, her response of "go fuck yourself" comes off as petty, self-centered and foolish rather than brave or defiant, especially because Santa very respectfully points out the legitimate reason she is a bad pick for the position, whilst also recognizing her legitimate managerial skills and thus offering her a very high-ranking managerial position, in effect becoming The Man Behind the Man to the next Santa. It's also difficult to root for someone who commits vehicular manslaughter on someone and leave them for dead because they were sexist.
Sonic's incarnation in Sonic the Hedgehog (SatAM) often teases or undermines his friends (even Antoine sometimes fails to be provocative enough), man handles (and has supposedly damaged) Sally's sentient computer NICOLE out of irritance, and frequently almost gets the rest of the team killed in an arrogant stunt. Add to that his inability to stop talking about how awesome he is for all of a minute, Sonic's characterization leans towards him being a Jerk Jock.
South Park:
- Kyle Broflovski is meant to be sympathized with because he (along with Stan) is the Only Sane Man and constantly has to deal with Cartman's shit, but at times, he ends up looking like a self-righteous, entitled Hypocrite. Season 5's "Cartmanland", shows that his faith in God depends on Cartman's misery. Episodes like "Good Times With Weapons", Douche and Turd "The List", "Fatbeard", and Super Hard PCness also show how easily he can be driven to commit atrocities for petty reasons. Unlike Stan (who is no stranger to What the Hell, Hero? moments), Kyle is rarely meaningfully called out for any of these events (sans the latter example), except by Cartman, who is usually meant to be in the wrong anyways.
- Sharon in the Tegridy Farms arc is supposed to come off as a battered wife to Randy's delusional selfishness and entitlement. However, she never actually tries to take action against Randy; her attitude towards him is that of just insulting him rather than taking the kids and leaving him or trying to get him to admit his actions on tape. She comes off as more guilty by association.
- Liane Cartman, especially in later seasons, is supposed to be sympathetic for having a horrific brat like Eric for a son. However, she's just as much to blame for Eric's behavior for spoiling him rotten, only ever disciplining him if his actions negatively affected her. Even after her son tricked a kid into cutting his leg off. The arc where the Cartmans live in an abandoned hot dog stand was supposed to be Eric's fault for his brattiness, but in the end, Liane still failed to put her foot down with him.
- Arc Villains Gerald, Randy, and Mr. Garrison in Season 25 and onward. While the narrative does hold them all accountable for their abrasive and selfish personalities (and it's not uncommon for some main or supporting characters to get away with reprehensible actions in an episode), their list of crimes in Seasons 20, 23, and 24 respectively is so large at this point that it pushes them past the Moral Event Horizon for many (namely Gerald's hidden identity as Skankhunt42, Randy's murder of Winnie-the-Pooh and Garrison's murder of the pangolin that was meant to end COVID), making any attempts to portray them as anything other than Villain Protagonists fall flat for many fans. However, Season 24 only gives Cartman any permanent Karma Houdini Warranty for crimes he committed as a kid, while Gerald is Easily Forgiven by Kyle and Ike after a few seasons, Randy gets to keep his family (and possibly his business) in the revised future, and Garrison gets to be in a healthy relationship with Rick in Season 26, making them all effective Karma Houdinis.
SpongeBob SquarePants:
- Patrick Star slips into this at his worst. He is meant to be an adorkable idiot who acts as SpongeBob's "best friend", but his jerkish behavior towards SpongeBob and the other characters and his selfishness (especially in later seasons) make fans wonder why Spongebob and Patrick are best friends.
- In "The Clash of Triton", we're supposed to feel sorry for King Neptune because he's depressed that his banished son, Triton, won't be there for his birthday party. But then we learn exactly why Triton was banished: his father, who believes it's acceptable to use his powers to harass normal undersea citizens, disapproved of Triton's aspirations to use his powers for the greater good, sending him away and locking him in a cage. As a result, Triton has gone through Sanity Slippage and immediately goes to get back at Neptune as soon as he's free. Neptune doesn't fully accept Triton back until he sees how his son trashed Bikini Bottom during his Roaring Rampage of Revenge. Finally, after getting absolutely no comeuppance for his actions, Neptune inadvertently sends an angry mob after SpongeBob and Patrick by saying everything that happened was "all because of him [SpongeBob]."
Star vs. the Forces of Evil
- Miss Sparkles from "The Bounce Lounge". In the episode, she reveals that she's closing up shop because she's getting too old to run the place after partying for five thousand years straight. Pony Head, Star and Marco understand this immediately and Know When to Fold 'Em to save the Bounce Lounge. Only problem is that she reveals this after the trio has bent over backwards first to fill up the Lounge with customers, and then to raise enough money to pay her mortgage. So she essentially wasted their time and effort, or perhaps even deliberately tricked them into paying off her debts for her. Then when Pony Head suggests that the patrons party in the Bounce Lounge to make its last night memorable, Miss Sparkles immediately tells everyone to Get Out! and destroys the place with a wrecking ball. This leaves everyone depressed, though Pony Head steals the photo booth as a consolation prize. This isn't helped by the fact that if Miss Sparkles simply wanted to retire, she could've just sold the Bounce Lounge to somebody else. Such as a pair of very wealthy princesses who desperately wanted to keep the place open.
- Glossaryck has also joined the ranks. Initially introduced as Star's tutor, he provided "useless" information to Marco in season one, and speaks in riddles that often confuse Star while teaching her at the same time. After several episodes of him and Star bonding in season two, with her learning complicated spells from him and finding Toffee's finger in the wand, he "switches teams" when Ludo steals his book and is quite cruel when Star tries to rescue him. He confirms to a Toffee-possessed Ludo that he is on no one's side, which puts his "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Queen Moon in "Page Turner" in a darker light, where he claims Omniscient Morality License and several thousand years of experience to justify his teaching methods. Rhombulus has also revealed that Glossaryck has a history of being an Ungrateful Bastard, something that Star has observed as well. And yet in "Page Turner" our sympathies are supposed to be with Glossaryck, whose chain is yanked around during the episode.
  - Again in "Book Be Gone": we're meant to be saddened by Glossaryk's death after Ludo threw the spell book into the fire. Except that Glossark brought this entirely on himself because he refused to outright tell Ludo why he was no longer the book's owner and who was now the book's owner (which would mean telling him about Toffee possessing him), showed repeated disinterest and even mocked Ludo for his efforts to get the book to let him write in it, and the only reason there even was a fire for Ludo to throw the book into was because Glossaryk made it in order to roast Pudding Balls.
  - He falls into this once again in the very last few moments of "Conquer". At the end of the episode, it's revealed that he was perfectly capable of talking normally all along. So why did he keep saying Globgor over and over as if he Came Back Wrong instead of just saying that he was Eclipsa's monster husband? Just for kicks, once again overcomplicating an issue that didn't need to be.
- Star Butterfly and Marco Diaz after "Booth Buddies". As some fans have started to notice, making the Star/Marco ship canon would require for Tom and Kelly to suffer the same heartbreaking fate of Jackie-Lynn, or become Derailing Love Interests, which would damage their credibility as characters. As a result, some fans have lost sympathy for their love story and started to think that, the way things are now, the only outcome would be Only the Leads Get a Happy Ending, at the cost of the perfectly nice other Love Interests. Star seems to realize this in "Booth Buddies" when, after kissing, she is shocked remembering she is still dating Tom.
  - It gets worse in Season 4. Despite the increasing issues with her relationship with Tom due to her hiding the fact she kissed Marco from him, Star repeatedly refuses to acknowledge her shortcomings and either turns the accusations back on the accuser, or tries to run away from the problem entirely. Outside of Tom, her attempts at maintaining the moral high ground when dealing with Eclipsa often fall flat due to the numerous bouts of hypocrisy she exhibits, primarily in regards to demanding trust from Eclipsa despite offering none herself and scolding her for not caring what her people think of her, even though a part of Star's growth as a princess and future queen had been about becoming her own kind of ruler and doing things her own way while being true to herself and doing what feels right to her even if others don't agree. It's taken to its extreme in "Tavern at the End of the Multiverse". Once Star has decided that magic needs to be destroyed to prevent the completion of Mina's genocide of the monsters, her only concern is the fact that doing so will force Marco back to Earth and make them incapable of seeing each other again. This in spite of the fact that doing so will not only rob all life of magic, not just Mewni, but will also kill everything reliant on magic to live, including Glossaryck, the Firstborn Unicorn, and presumably Hekapoo. Arguably this launches Star straight into Well-Intentioned Extremist or even Knight Templar territory, given that there are hundreds of thousands if not millions or billions of beings made of magic in the multiverse (the Spells, the Magic High Commission, and everything and everyone that lives in the Magic Dimension just for a start) and she'll presumably be killing all of them solely to save one country (her's) in one dimension (her's), a genocide comparable to if not bigger than Mina's. Yet Star's only concern is that she won't get to see Marco ever again.
Steven Universe:
- The plot of the episode "Too Far" is centered around Amethyst having her feelings hurt by Peridot; joking about how a gem like her would normally be much bigger and stronger than she is, with her form essentially being a defect. The rest of the episode is centered around Peridot learning about how to interact with people and when apologies are owed, with Amethyst treated as a pure victim of the situation. This is undermined fairly significantly by the moments preceding the unintended insult consisting of Amethyst laughing her ass off and shouting encouragement while Peridot mercilessly mocks her family members for their most precious traits and deepest insecurities. This makes her come off less as someone deserving an apology and more like a hypocritical jerk who can't take what she dishes out. The fact that Peridot honestly didn't know any better (being entirely new to life outside Homeworld) and what she said being a product of Amethyst egging her on and an attempted compliment doesn't help.
- Pearl as a whole has moments of this. Many of her actions come off as super smug, which, while meant to make us think, "oh it's because she thinks so lowly of herself" doesn't really always work. The Week of Sardonyx as a whole divided many fans given it is meant to make us get a better look into Pearl. Yet in the end despite trying to put Pearl on the spot for her actions, though it briefly does, she essentially escapes any real consequences for them. Which isn't helped by having Steven have a Leaning on the Fourth Wall moment in "Historical Friction" that kinda sidesteps the pain Pearl's caused by focusing on how flaws are neat and make her a better character, and "Keystone Motel" vaguely trying to make it seem like Ruby's being stubborn for not wanting to forgive Pearl, bypassing any real hope of punishment for Pearl with Sapphire saying that Ruby has to forgive Pearl.
- All three Crystal Gems, particularly Garnet, come off as this in the episode "It Could Have Been Great". When the Crystal Gems investigate Pink Diamond's moon base, they come across a computer showing plans that show what would've happened had the Diamonds successfully colonized Earth. Peridot, still loyal to Homeworld despite her alliance with the Crystal Gems, begins gushing over them and insulting Rose's rebellion, enraging the Crystal Gems, particularly Garnet, who could have poofed her or worse had Steven not intervened (she was restraining herself, but if Peridot was given a chance to keep talking, who knows how long that restraint would last?) While Peridot was unambiguously wrong to do what she did, to many fans, the Crystal Gems' response was completely and needlessly disproportionate and made them come off as jerks. Especially since they never apologize for their actions nor explain why colonization of Earth was bad and the episode treats it as if it was just Peridot in the wrong. Thankfully, all of them get better in the next episode.
- Onion as a whole also comes off as this. He's meant to be portrayed as a mischievous-but-harmless prankster with a Hidden Heart of Gold, but to many fans, he comes off as a sociopathic Enfant Terrible whose actions are as borderline criminal or an amoral child who is unlikeable, due to not caring about the consequences of his actions. Case in point: The episode "Onion Trade" had him stealing Steven's prized action figure and later using it to trick Steven into trading it for Pearl's replicator, which he promptly used to wreak havoc on Beach City, even trying to outright murder the Crystal Gems when they try to stop him. Yet despite all this, he's never called out for his actions and is treated as if he did nothing wrong. While he does have a Freudian Excuse as his father Yellowtail is too busy working to spend time with him and his mother Vidalia doesn't seem to be too interested in taking care of him, this excuse is flimsy at best when you consider that Steven had never even met his mother, yet turned out to be one of the kindest members of the cast. That said, the episode "Onion Gang" paints him in a far more kinder and more sympathetic light than in previous appearances.
- Lars' character involves him masking his insecurity and anxiety issues by acting like a jerk to those around him, partially in a misguided attempt to seem "cool"; his arc has him move one step forward, two steps back until he eventually realizes that his behavior is driving away those he loves, and only then does he truly make efforts to improve himself and face his issues. While the intent behind his character is clear, the execution is incredibly lackluster, with Lars more often than not coming off as an actual jerk being an ass for the sake of it that never learns his lesson.
Tangled: The Series:
- Uncle Monty from "Rapunzel's Enemy" after we learn why he doesn't like Rapunzel while liking everyone else. It's because Rapunzel isn't a traditional princess, and Monty likes traditional values. But what else is he expecting when Rapunzel was stolen from her parents and locked in a tower for eighteen years? Of course she can't be a traditional princess after suffering emotional abuse and constant isolation. It's not like the circumstances of Rapunzel's upbringing are unknown to the public; the tale of the Lost Princess spread, and the celebration of her return lasted a week according to Eugene. Uncle Monty practices Victim-Blaming in judging Rapunzel for her quirks, when most of them are a result of trauma. It certainly doesn't help his case that he likes to throw tomatoes at a statue of Rapunzel for fun.
- King Frederic fell into this towards the season finale. The show tries to make us feel sorry for him when his relationship with Rapunzel begins to fall apart, and how his various actions over the course of the series was, at least from his perspective, a case of I Did What I Had to Do. However, people saw the ramifications of his actions as Laser-Guided Karma for his stubborn refusal to acknowledge the existence of the black rocks, which ends up putting his own innocent subjects in danger. He repeatedly tries to control Rapunzel's life, keeps secrets from her and his wife, and eventually resorts to actual parental abuse when he has Rapunzel locked away. His actions make him very much like Gothel. And because of the rushed end to the season finale, many fans felt that Frederic's actions were not called out nearly enough by anyone except Ariana, who does acknowledge that Frederic being motivated by genuine love and concern for his daughter doesn't make his actions right by any means.
- Rapunzel herself falls into this starting from the end of "Queen For A Day" until the last few episodes of season 1. Even though she believes turning away Varian's request to save his father in the midst of the blizzard as My Greatest Failure, she doesn't go to check up on Varian once the crisis was over and apparently forgets about the whole incident until several episodes later. Some fans felt this only reinforced Varian's bitterness towards Corona's apathy that led to his Face–Heel Turn.
- The citizens of Vardaros (except Quaid and Vex, who have redeeming qualities and are frequent help to the main cast) fall hard into this trope. Sure, Rapunzel didn't handle the situation the best and should have taken "no" for an answer when Cassandra made it clear that Vardaros doesn't want to be made like Corona, but she was still genuinely trying to help them out, yet a few slip ups from her cause them to essentially form a lynch mob mentality against her. What's worse is that they suffer no consequences for their behavior.
Terra in Teen Titans (2003) is supposed to be a emotionally lost and confused girl lashing out blindly at a world that has tormented her relentlessly for years, making her falling into Slade's manipulative clutches only to be further abused by him a tragic turn of events. For some viewers, she loses sympathy because of... well, take your pick!
- Just how easily she lets herself by manipulated by the obviously creepy supervillain who she was warned likes to play mindgames, resulting in her abandoning the Titans to choose Slade instead at her episode's end, despite their making no effort to drive her away or even scold her for her Power Incontinence.
- Her refusal to even consider betraying Slade when the Titans welcome her with open arms after she is sent to infiltrate their numbers for him.
- Her getting mad that Beast Boy is angry with her for betraying the team and leaving everyone else but him to die to Slade's Mecha-Mooks. This is then compounded by her going after her former teammates, who all make it clear they would still welcome her back if she just turns on Slade now, only for Terra to not even hesitate in going for the kill.
- Her hypocritical cowardice at going from bragging that she feels nothing for (as far as she knows) brutally killing all of the Titans, to begging them for mercy when they return and start fighting her for real.
- Her only turning on Slade after he reveals he really doesn't view her as anything more than just another tool like his Mecha-Mooks, which he does by beating her and then hijacking control of her body, making her final retaliation against him seem less like her finally doing the heroic thing and more like her just trying to get revenge and coincidentally doing something heroic in the process.
Theodore Tugboat:
- Hank in "Hank and the Hug". Hank gets angry at the other tugboats for not wanting to play with him, despite the fact that they all have jobs to do.
- Emily in "Theodore in the Middle". George makes an official complaint about Emily being late to the morning work meeting, which is treated as a Kick the Dog moment and the rest of the episode tries to play it as Both Sides Have a Point. However, George rightfully points out that Emily's lateness delays the morning briefing and causes problems for the visiting ships who need the tugboats' help. The fact that she tends to be late fairly regularly is also a big no-no in the workforce. The Dispatcher wouldn't have given George the option of making an official complaint if Emily wasn't breaking the rules with her lateness. Emily getting mad at George for making the complaint makes her look like the Team Prima Donna pulling a Never My Fault.
In Thomas & Friends, almost every part of the railway from the engines to the brake vans are alive and capable of acting on their own to some degree. Sir Topham Hatt, also known as the Fat Controller, runs the railway - and every time there is an accident, he often admonishes the engine about causing it. While this is understandable in cases where the accident is caused by an engine acting foolish, it's less understandable when the cause is actually the Troublesome Trucks (which it usually is) push the engine or hold back. This makes it seem very much like Topham Hatt is Blaming the Victim. Some of this can be explained by Values Dissonance (as Awdry was very old fashioned - even when the books the show was originally adapted from were written in The '40s). What is also a little more frustrating is that on occasion, Hatt will actually be more empathetic, such as an accident happening due to faulty equipment or bad weather.
ThunderCats (2011): Cheetara after choosing Tygra over Lion-O. You can't really blame Lion-O for harboring resentment and jealousy over her and Tygra after all the mixed signals she sent him throughout the first few episodes. Furthermore, when the three of them are attacked by Mumm-Ra's three generals, she opts to surrender when Tygra is captured despite the fact that doing so won't save either of them.
Jerry of Tom and Jerry sometimes gets flak for this. While he is often the defending character being chased or victimized by Tom, sometimes he could be sadistic, attacking Tom with minimal or no provocation whatsoever. Allegedly, MGM recieved fan letters siding with Tom over Jerry, so the creators began to moderate the formula with Laser-Guided Karma, with Tom usually acting more vindictive, and actually allowed to get the last laugh on Jerry whenever the latter took his offense to an unsympathetic level.
TUGS: Captain Star is meant to be a honest man in contrast to his rival, Captain Zero but, in Pirate, he refuses to believe Ten Cents' side of the story about the missing barge, claiming he must take the clients' word, despite scolding his tugs for jumping to the wrong conclusion in the previous episode. Worst of all, in Quarantine, he not only threatens Ten Cents and Sunshine with being scrapped if they're late again, but almost actually scraps O.J. after his engine breaks down and only relents when Ten Cents informs him that O.J. saved him from being quarantined. Even Captain Zero never stooped that low.
Tutenstein: Cleo falls under this in "Keep Your Wandering Eye To Yourself". Yes, it was wrong for Tut to spy on her out of jealousy of her hanging out with other friends, but denouncing their friendship was a bit harsh considering he's done a lot worse than that over the course of the series and they've still stuck together and cleaned up his messes.
Velma:
- Our title character, Velma Dinkley, is meant to be the most intelligent person in the series as well as unapologetically lacking any sort of filter but instead comes across as a judgmental, cynical, selfish, manipulative, racist (she frequently insults Fred for being white), sexist (she berates prettier girls), disgusting (she once twerks over someone's dead body) hypocrite who has an incredibly misanthropic, Never My Fault view of the world, which makes her insecurities come across as Wangst. This only increases as the show goes on, as while the show does start calling her out for her behavior and flaws, her learning to better herself and accept her role in things such as ruining her friendship with Daphne comes across as exasperating rather than satisfying character growth due to how much other characters need to drag her kicking and screaming into each Jerkass Realization.
- Daphne is supposed to garner sympathy as someone selling drugs to get money to hire a private investigator so she can find her biological family. This falls incredibly flat as from the very start as she’s an unrepentant Alpha Bitch who tries to force her boyfriend Fred into a physical relationship with no regard for how he feels and her adopted moms seem to really care about her so her Gene Hunting feels more like a tacked on excuse to justify her drug dealing.
Wallace & Gromit:
- Wallace is meant to be portrayed as a well-meaning, decent-enough goof. However, he is incredibly lazy when it comes to household situations (apart from inventing), having his inventions get him dressed and out of bed, and making his pet dog slave around the house.
  - In The Wrong Trousers, for Gromit's birthday, Wallace gives Gromit robotic trousers that are supposed to take Gromit for walks, but they work a little bit too well, practically jerking poor Gromit all the way round the village. Then, Wallace welcomes into the house Feathers McGraw, a penguin who turns out to be a wanted criminal. When the latter does things to antagonise Gromit, such as stealing his room, Wallace doesn't lift a finger. He even begins to ignore Gromit in favour of Feathers McGraw, causing Gromit to feel neglected and leave home.
Winx Club:
- Prince Sky in Season 1 flirts with Bloom under the guise that he is Brandon while Brandon, his bodyguard, pretends to be Sky. This has disastrous consequences when we learn that Sky is already engaged to Princess Diaspro. He is never called out for cheating on his fiancee with Bloom or for leading Bloom on, and the audience is instead supposed to sympathize with Bloom who attacks Diaspro unprovoked.
- Bloom in season 3 constantly wangsts about how she has no parents and no kingdom, and thus should not be able to achieve Enchantix. Not only does this make her seem ungrateful towards her loving adoptive parents (an issue that occurs in later seasons as well), but comes off as incredibly self-centered when the other Winx members have issues they are going through and Bloom has an It's All About Me attitude over a power up.
The "Breakdown" episode that deals with Cyclops's origins on Wolverine and the X-Men (2009). Though meant to gain the viewer's sympathy by showing what a tragic and awkward life he's suffered all the episode really does is kill what little credibility Cyclops was meant to have by portraying him first as an incompetent idiot who couldn't do anything right without Jean Grey there to hold his hand and then portraying him as a petty, insecure boyfriend who completely lost control of himself when Wolverine started hitting on Jean. True, Wolverine was being a jerk but Cyclops's reaction was way out of line.
- And yet, in classic Double Standard fashion, it's perfectly okay for Jean to rough up Emma Frost when she sees the blonde getting too friendly with Cyclops.
In X-Men: Evolution, Lance's romantic subplot with Kitty starts with him saving her life — from an accident that he caused. He had also previously attempted to attack Kitty, and due to the nature of his powers, he tends to cause a lot of collateral damage (sometimes near schools populated by children who are never confirmed to have gotten out alive). To some people, all this makes it kind of hard to believe that Kitty would want him for a boyfriend. This also puts him in the somewhat unusual situation of being a common victim of both Ron the Death Eater and Draco in Leather Pants.
- A weird inversion actually happens because of this. The time Avalanche did attempt a Heel–Face Turn, Scott doesn't buy it and proceeds to mistrust him. This is made out to be wrong of Scott, except, he is completely justified in mistrusting him: Lance was actually his biggest rival and had pulled crap on him and others before. While we (as the audience) knew that Lance was trying to do good things for Kitty's sake, Scott simply lacked such knowledge since Lance had given him reason to be antagonistic, and thus it's understandable to have him not trust Lance off the bat, and it would've been Out of Character otherwise.
  - The fact that Lance doesn't try very hard to convince Scott otherwise doesn't help him either. And the fact that Lance rejects Scott's heartfelt apology (after Scott found out that he had been wrong about Lance) and goes back to the Brotherhood really doesn't help.
Young Justice (2010) fell into this trap a few times. Neither Superboy nor his designated mentor Superman come off being particularly sympathetic, albeit for different reasons. We're obviously meant to sympathize with Superboy because Superman refuses to spend any time with him because he's creeped out by the fact that someone cloned him without him knowing it, but Superboy is such a rage prone whiner that after awhile it's hard to feel bad for him. Superman, meanwhile, is portrayed as a shallow, superficial Dirty Coward and Jerkass for refusing to overcome his personal issues to help the obviously troubled Superboy, and the show does absolutely nothing at all to actually develop a relationship between them outside of a cheap "good job kid" moment at the end of Season 1 and then doing a time skip to avoid doing any actual character development, making their "brotherly" interactions in Season 2 look inherently false.
- Then there's Roy Harper, AKA: Speedy, AKA: Red Arrow, We're obviously meant to feel bad for the first Roy we're introduced to when he learns that he's actually a clone who was used as an infiltrator against the heroes, but he spends so much of the show being a nasty, belligerent little asshole mistreating everyone around him that it's impossible to feel bad for him.
- Garfield Logan, AKA: Beast Boy falls into this HARD in Season 4. He goes through a fair deal of trauma throughout the season, which lead up to Superboy's apparent death. We're supposed to feel bad for the crap he's gone through, and understand he's just lashing out because of it before rooting for his eventual recovery. However, prior to Superboy's death his paranoia on Mars leads to him putting everyone in danger, and once everyone's on Earth after the fact he is such a nasty piece of work, mercilessly ripping apart anyone who even attempts to help him, breaking up with his girlfriend for daring to worry about him that instead of wanting him to get the therapy he eventually does get, you find yourself wanting someone like Batman showing up to tear him a new one. This is even worse considering M'gann, you know Connor's FIANCEE, is also naturally devastated but grieves personally without taking it out on everyone else, on top of doing the job she's expected to do unlike Beast Boy who all but outright quit being an Outsider. He does get better, but it's very unpleasant getting there.
Zeke's Pad: Some may find Zeke too selfish/reckless to root for, especially when several episodes' conflicts are his own fault (either because he was acting petty or lazy).

Unintentionally Unsympathetic / Western Animation

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