Women Are Wiser / Western Animation

• The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron, Boy Genius: Though Jimmy is smarter than both of them, Hugh is definitely the stupid one in the family.
• In The Amazing World of Gumball, the male and female characters outside of the Gumball home each have their personality quirks based on what kind of creature they are, but within the household Gumball's mother and sister are two of the smartest characters in the show and their father by far the dumbest and laziest guy in town who once even had a competition to see who's the laziest with the man who's now the town's hardest worker but who used to go by the name of "Lazy Larry". His father's brain literally barely functions at all as a result of bad, overprotective parenting from his mother, and his foolishness has led to complete destruction of Elmore as well as financial ruin for the Wattersons many times, but the family still loves him nevertheless. His sister is even found to have a genius IQ. Gumball and Darwin are both equally stupid, but Darwin seems to have more common sense when it comes to Gumball's hair-brained schemes.
• Played with in American Dad!. While Stan is no doubt much more out of touch and outright insane than his wife, considering some of the things Francine's tried to do, she's Closer to Earth the same way Mars is "Closer To Earth" than Neptune.
  • For example, Francine abandoned her children for a year just so she could get revenge on George Clooney for upstaging her in a bit part she had on a sitcom twenty years earlier. Of course, Stan went along with it, but only to make her happy.
  • This is probably best described as a Zig-Zagging Trope. Which one of them is closer to Earth is largely dependent on the situation. If it's something involving politics or one of the kids behaving oddly, Stan flies off the handle and Francine is the reasonable one. If it has to do with their marriage or social status, Francine flies off the handle and Stan is the reasonable one. Each one needs the other the keep them sane at different times... kind of like a real marriage!
  • In terms of role designation, the trope is still usually played straight, however, due to Stan usually playing the Bumbling Dad role and getting the vaster share of Aesops handed to him than Francine. Francine has clear flaws, but they are more often played for quick gags with her usually having to deal with Stan's problems rather than instigate her own (even the odd times she is made to learn a lesson, it usually involves her having to put up with Stan's own stupidity). Steve and Hayley have a similar dynamic.
  • Played in its fullest throttle in "Hurricane". While Francine and Hayley are full-blown Action Survivors, all of the male Smiths act as The Millstone and make things worse. Complete with failed Chekhovs Guns, the Aesop of the episode even more or less being that Stan is completely incompetent compared to Francine.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender: Aang's immediate predecessors as Avatar fit this at first glance. Yangchen and Kyoshi (female) were both proactive and intelligent Avatars who were regarded fondly; the former was a peacemaker whose reign is widely cited as the best of all Avatars, while the latter had an extremely long and prosperous reign that successfully averted a dictator-in-the-making. Meanwhile, Kuruk and Roku (male) initially enjoyed the fruits bore by their female predecessors, only to end up screwing up the world; the former was remembered more for drinking than actually being an Avatar, ultimately dying a premature death, while the latter's indecisiveness directly led to the Hundred Year War and the near-extinction of the Air Nomads. However, the comics paint a more nuanced and complicated angle. Kuruk did shirk his duties as Avatar, but only in the human world; he actually spent most of his time killing dark spirits who were angered by the broken deals brokered by Yangchen, because she always preferred humans over spirits, even though Avatars are supposed to be the bridge connecting both. Kuruk's murder of the spirits led his own life force to shorten considerably, but he never revealed this to the world, because he did not want to tarnish Yangchen's legacy. Meanwhile, Kyoshi was the founder of Dai Li, who would trouble Aang and Korra when it transformed from a benign cultural guardian into the State Sec of Ba Sing Se. Ultimately, it becomes clear that all Avatars, whether they are male and female, made mistakes that their future predecessors will have to deal with.
• Bob's Burgers: Averted with Bob and Linda. Both of them get carried away from time to time, but the frequency and degree differs. Bob plays the Straight Man more often than not, but when it's his turn to be irrational, he does it big. In contrast, Linda's flights of fancy are more frequent, but they tend to be pretty benign more often than not. Fortunately, when push comes to shove, they've got each other's backs.
• BoJack Horseman: "Wiser" is always relative in the series' Dysfunction Junction, but of its five main characters, the women tend to be more sensible and are often tasked with wrangling whichever characters are in their orbit. Compare the ambitious, organized, and prone-to-pep-talking agent/manager Princess Carolyn and the nerdy and socially aware writer Diane to the self-destructive and messy BoJack, the lazy slacker Todd, and the blissfully oblivious Mr. Peanutbutter.
• Chowder: Inverted with Truffles, who is short-tempered, obnoxious to everyone and, especially, loud, while her husband, Mung Daal, is calmer and more level-headed.
• Courage the Cowardly Dog: Muriel plays with this trope. While she's definitely much wiser than her Jerkass husband Eustace, given how Eustace often ends up on the receiving end of great danger due to his stupidity and stubbornness, Muriel's intelligence often varies depending on the events she goes through. In some episodes, she is very aware of the danger she and the other two main characters come across. In others, she usually trusts some of the villains despite how clearly ominous they appear.
• Danny Phantom: Played straight and subverted with Maddie. While she definitely plays a better parental figure than Jack, she will be just as obsessed and out-of-focus as her husband if a ghost catches her attention. With a series about ghosts, this happens quite frequently.
  • Even in that case, she's much more competent and rational in her ghost hunting and tends to avoid seeing ghosts where there are none and overreacting like Jack does.
  • Although it seems that Jack is something of a Genius Ditz who actually may be smarter than Maddie in some respects. Most of their equipment, although maintained by Maddie, is usually invented by Jack.
• Dan Vs.: Elise, while having her Not So Above It All moments, is usually much more rational and level-headed than both her husband and his psychopathic friend. This gets exaggerated big time in the second season, especially when most of the episodes in the second season have Elise stealing the spotlight from the main character, and the ones in which she isn't the focus on, she often saves Dan and Chris through Deus ex Machina.
• Daria: The female characters are almost always more dominant (and developed) than the males. Played With, however, because being well-developed also often means they have more noticeable flaws. (Jake, for example, is a ditzy Bumbling Dad, but Helen is a Workaholic who sometimes seems less sympathetic.) Daria's relationship with Tom can also be seen as an Inversion.
• Dave the Barbarian: Completely averted with its female leads. While the titular Dave is a stereotypical Dumb Muscle barbarian man, his sisters Candy and Fang are respectively a shallow Valley Girl who cares more about going shopping than doing her royal duties and a violent tomboy whose main interest is basically smashing things up. There is also the (female) magic sword Lula, who is rude and abrasive to everyone. In fact, the voice of reason is, usually, their Inept Mage uncle Oswidge.
• Drawn Together is an odd case, both Toot and Clara are often portrayed as just as bad, if not worse than the males in the house. Foxxy Love, however (although she's certainly no saint) has been described as the only one "not totally retarded" and is generally the most caring, responsible, and motivated person on the show. She's also black, so it's probably her being a Flawless Token.
• Played with in The Dreamstone, Amberley seems slightly more competent and well adjusted than Rufus, but also somewhat more boisterous and moody compared to other peers. Similarly played with Wildit, who is one of the most experienced and skilled Wuts alongside being one of the dizziest.
• DuckTales (2017):
  • Zan Owlson is the only female CEO seen in the series, and she manages to be a lot more moral and competent than most of the male CEOs (which is especially noticeable with Glomgold, who she ends up interacting with the most). She even manages to come off as this to Scrooge, to an extent; both are highly competent, but unlike Scrooge, she's far less likely to give in to a petty grudge.
  • Of all the major members of the Rogues Gallery, Ma Beagle is both one of the only females (there's also Magica and Goldie, but they have their own issues) and quite possibly the sanest of them all. All of her children are male and dumber than she is.
• Cosmo and Wanda in The Fairly OddParents!. While Wanda usually serves as an Only Sane Man who advises Timmy against stupid wishes, Cosmo tends to openly encourage them.
  • To a lesser extent, Timmy's parents. Sure, they're both nuts, but his dad's considerably more nuts.
  • Inverted with Anti-Cosmo and Anti-Wanda. Anti-Cosmo is an Evil Genius, while Anti-Wanda is a dim-witted redneck who eats with her feet.
• Lois and Peter Griffin in Family Guy. This is somewhat subverted in that Lois is far from perfect herself, often giving in to temptations such as theft and lust. While she always outshines Peter, she is often outshone by their intellectual and compassionate dog, Brian. Of course, even Brian has a number of character flaws like alcoholism and angry outbursts. For the first season at least, though, it was played completely straight. Peter is always the jerk or the idiot, and if Lois ever loses her patience, it's only due to having been driven to the point where even Mother Theresa would lose it. She and Meg only develop real comic character flaws in later seasons (though given its evolution into more sadistic humor they take said flaws to extremes).
• Given a twist in Futurama. While Leela is certainly the most sensible of the crew, Fry is undoubtedly the kindest most moral character on the show. Furthermore, while Leela is much more intelligent and mature than Fry, she is often shown as stubborn and short-tempered to contrast Fry's mellowness.
• Goof Troop has a Competence Zone that drastically favors 11-year-olds... when it comes to the guys. Peg, the only adult woman in the cast, is also the Only Sane Woman a lot of the time, and actually has more sense than Pete (which of her and PJ has more primarily depended on who is in focus). Completely averted with the Petes' kids, though, with PJ being the Only Sane Man whenever Peg isn't and Pistol being totally hyperactive — it should be noted, however, that PJ is both in the Competence Zone and In Touch with His Feminine Side, while Pistol is extremely young.
• Noodle from Gorillaz has been the most mentally stable and well-adjusted member of the group so far. Strangely, she remained so even after she regained her memory in between Phases 1 and 2, learning that she was trained as a Super-Soldier for the Japanese government and the only alive kid left from the project.
• The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy:
  • Another aversion. Mandy is way smarter than Billy (not that that's a very high bar, anyway) but is also amoral, mean, and manipulative. In fact, arguably the closest the show has to character who's both sensible and morally adjusted is Grim.
  • Inverted initially with Billy's parents Harold and Gladys. Aside from being comically oblivious to the supernatural goings-on around him, Harold started out as a rational and level-headed man, while his wife Gladys has always had a pronounced psychotic side. The only reason she could be considered "wiser" than Harold is because, unlike him, she was fully aware that Grim was a living skeleton. Even after Harold lost a good deal of his intelligence, Gladys became even crazier, so she still couldn't be called "wiser".
• With the four members of Grojband, Laney is the sole girl of the band, as well as the most rational, mature, and sensible member of the group. She's usually the one who has to pull the others back down to earth, point out problems in their Zany Schemes, or snark at her bandmates goofing around.
• Played with on Jimmy Two-Shoes. Heloise, the token girl, is far and away the smartest character on the show and is the one who really keeps Miseryville running in the face of the incompetence of her male coworkers. However, she's also a deranged, sadistic Enfant Terrible who mainly uses her skills to make the rest of the population miserable For the Evulz, while Jimmy is the show's moral centre.
• Kim Possible: Both Kim and Shego are more sensible and capable than their hilariously incompetent male partners, Ron and Dr. Drakken. Although Ron is only incompetent when he's a good guy. As a bad guy he inexplicably displays frightening levels of competence and brilliance that can even bring Shego to heel.
• Inverted in King of the Hill. Hank is down-to-earth and grounded (even to the point of being a wet blanket). Peggy is crazy and out there. She perceives the situation... differently. Luanne is a Dumb Blonde.
• A possible species-wide example from The Life and Times of Juniper Lee in the case of the Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti that the main characters meet; the males are barely functioning idiots with short-term memory problems (their chief forgets he's the chief several times in a single conversation). The only Sasquatch with any common sense and useful skills is Lila, the only confirmed female we see and roughly June's age to boot. She joins June at the end of the episode to try out the "normal kid" side of things, including attending the main characters' elementary school.
• The Looney Tunes Show plays it straight with Daffy and Tina, but completely inverts it with Bugs and Lola.
• On Mack & Moxy, the female raccoon Moxy is portrayed as being more competent than Mack, who suffers from a downplayed Moose Are Idiots characterization.
• Molly of Denali: In "Molly and the Great One", Mac Mc Fadden's female producer/possible romantic partner Andie is far more intelligent and sensible than he is.
• Averted on Moral Orel. Bloberta Puppington's abuse is more subtle than her husband's, but, in her own way, she's just as horrible a parent, Christian, and human being in general as Clay.
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: Pick a princess, any princess at all, and compare her to Prince Blueblood. On that note, compare the villains like Nightmare Moon and Queen Chrysalis ^note Freudian Excuse for the former, and out for the survival of her species for the latter to Discord, who simply did things For the Evulz^note He probably considered ponies as far beneath him as playthings, though., and King Sombra, who wanted to enslave the ponies. Due to this being a series primarily made for girls, most of the wise and competent roles are filled by females who get the lion's share of Character Development, while males are often limited to supporting characters or antagonists tend to be either evil or immature.
  • There are inversions, however. Spike frequently plays the role of the Straight Man to whenever Twilight (and sometimes the entire Mane six) starts to get a little anxious and crazy. The Stoic Big Mac also acts as the most sensible member of his all-female part of the Apple family. Furthermore, Celestia may take the cake in being the wisest character on the show, but the flashback in the "Reflections" arc in the comic series has the younger Celestia ignoring the male Star Swirl's warnings to not utilize a portal to travel to another dimension.
• Played both ways on Phineas and Ferb: Linda is generally more grounded than Lawrence, and Doofenshmirtz's craziness is contrasted by both his ex-wife and daughter's sanity. However, Candace is absolutely neurotic, making her far less down-to-earth than either of her brothers or her love interest Jeremy. These cases are murky, though; Candace (and Lawrence to a lesser extent) seem kookier, but then, they're the ones who know what's really going on, so...
  • In fact, the few times that Linda catches a glimpse of just how strange her life really is, she becomes almost as neurotic as Candace.
• Ready Jet Go! loves this trope. The girls in the show, such as Sydney, Mindy, Celery, and Dr. Rafferty, are much more intelligent, competent, and level-headed compared to their male counterparts Jet, Sean, Carrot, and Dr. Bergs, all of which end up as the butt of jokes most of the time.
• Subverted and deconstructed by Beth and Jerry in Rick and Morty. Jerry is constantly shown as being idiotic, self-defeating, and inadequate, and he allows Beth to put him down because she tolerates his many failings. That certainly looks like this dynamic at first, but it slowly becomes apparent that Beth tolerates their codependent relationship because she is in many ways just as broken as Jerry, getting a perverse schadenfreude-laden pleasure out of seeing him fail so that she can continue feeling superior and knowing that, pathetic as he is, he'll never leave her the way her father did no matter how badly she treats him. Ultimately, Beth is almost certainly more intelligent and competent than Jerry, but wiser? Nuh-uh.
• On Rocko's Modern Life, Bev Bighead is far less hostile than Ed Bighead. While the latter is shown in one episode to have arranged a team of scientists devoted to killing Rocko and his friends, Bev has no animosity towards him.
• Rugrats: The parents show evidence of this. With Stu and Didi, Didi is the rational one and the disciplinarian, and of Betty and Howard, Betty is the stronger one and more decisive. This also seems to be the case with Randy and Lucy. However, it's subverted with Chaz and Kira who are both competent parents, although Chaz does slip into Bumbling Dad territory. Completely averted with Drew and Charlotte, who are both awful parents, as Angelica demonstrates.
  • Played with for Stu and Didi; Stu is more eccentric and childish, but far more laid back than neurotic, overly cautious Didi. Howard is similarly a Nervous Wreck, but less abrasive than Betty.
• The Simpsons:
  • Marge and Homer Simpson take to the point of parody. Homer is the archetypical dimwitted sitcom husband who nearly always needs to learn a moral lesson in any given episode, which he is almost certain to forget by the next. Marge, on the other hand, is so down-to-earth that she is incredibly boring.
  • Bart and Lisa Simpson do this too, albeit to a much lesser extent than their parents — Lisa is certainly much more intelligent than Bart, but Bart is the more socially adept of the two and isn't nearly as dumb as his father.
  • Taken to its logical extreme in the episode "Lisa The Simpson," where Lisa discovers to her horror that all Simpsons start out as intelligent as her, but suffer from a genetic condition that causes them to gradually get dumber as they age until they end up as dumb as Homer. At the end of the episode, she is relieved to find out that only the men have this condition, while the Simpson women all keep their intelligence into adulthood and are all very successful with high-status jobs.
• In the American The Smurfs series, the producers tried to compensate for Smurfette being the only female Smurf by making her smarter than most of the population to the point where she is almost the Second in Command of the village.
• Sonic the Hedgehog (SatAM): While Sally had palpable flaws such as overcautiousness and a haughty temper, they came at the expense of her competence a lot less often than Sonic's, and a lot of the time, Sally had to keep Sonic in check when his overconfidence or reckless attitude lands him in trouble. Bunnie and Dulcy were somewhat ditzier, but still made far less detrimental mistakes than him or Antoine.
• Sonic Boom, on the other hand, is willing to play with gender dynamics for laughs on a case-by-case basis. The episode "Into the Wilderness" does show Amy and Sticks being wiser than Sonic and Knuckles in regards to wilderness survival, but when you consider that Sticks is the group's expert on the subject and Amy was more willing to learn than Sonic, it makes complete sense. Combined with Sticks and Amy's foibles in many other situations, the roles are reversed just as often.
• South Park plays this straight with the Marsh family (Sharon is often exasperated by the idiotic things Randy does), inverts it with the Broflovski family (Gerald is relatively sane, while Sheila is a nutjob) and averts it with the McCormick family (Stuart and Carol spend too much of their time fighting for one to clearly be depicted as being any smarter than the other).
  • Even the Broflovskis zigzag with it since Gerald is also an occasionally immoral lawyer. Similarly, Sharon is only sane compared to Randy, and pretty much all adults, male or female, revert to moronic panic whenever something plagues the town (be it warranted or not). Stan and Wendy also flip flop with this, both are prone to acts of childishness and self-righteousness as they alternate acting as the Only Sane Man.
  • Generally speaking, as collectives, the girls are more productive, more resilient, better organized, and stronger-willed than the boys, and the men cause more trouble than the women.
  • This is deconstructed in Season 23's "Turd Burglars", where the A-plot of the episode is titled "One for the Ladies". In this episode, the women of South Park are given A Day in the Limelight, and it's clearly shown that the women are just as disgusting, horrible, backstabbing, and idiotic as the men are. To top it all off, all the trouble the women cause is shown to be much more dangerous than all the troubles the men have caused, as the women end up getting infected with C-Diff and contaminate more than half of South Park to the point where they would've died if it weren't for the boys finding a cure for the outbreak their mothers caused.
• Played straight in The Spectacular Spider-Man. Among the friend trio of Peter, Gwen and Harry, Gwen Stacy is the most observant and concerned for Harry.
• Spliced plays this completely straight, both with Patricia (in relation to Peri, Joe, and Entree) and Octocat (in relation to Smarty Smarts).
• Squirrel Boy inverts this with Mr. and Mrs. J. Mr. J is usually no-nonsense while Mrs. J is usually gleefully flighty.
• TaleSpin has Baloo and Rebecca play a similar (albeit more platonic) example. While Rebecca is slightly less impulsive and obnoxious than Baloo, she shares his stubbornness and ego (and is also a borderline Control Freak). Word of God suggests they were intended to foil each other in different aspects. Baloo was Book Dumb and slovenly, but also streetwise and resourceful due to his adventuring. Rebecca was a logical businesswoman and well educated, but also somewhat naive and inept to the outside world. Generally if depending on the scenario, either could play the Idiot Ball, with the other playing the Closer to Earth Straight Man.
• Teen Titans has Jinx, both the only girl in the H.I.V.E. Five and the only one who strives to be anything more than a common street villain the Titans beat on a weekly basis (more specifically, to join the Brotherhood of Evil). She's also the only one to take a Heel–Face Turn of the High Heel variety.
• The Tick: There's American Maid, a completely competent confident superheroine in a cast that includes mostly insane and retarded heroes alongside posturing ineffectual heroes and meek neurotic sidekicks. They also have an exchange with a female superhero team in Belgium, this team is shown to be more powerful and more competent than Arthur and the Tick.
• Inverted in Tiny Toon Adventures, where Buster was far less flighty and impulsive than Babs.
• The Unstoppable Yellow Yeti: Rita is the most intelligent and mature of the main trio, being friends with her laidback, fun-loving cousin Osmo and the goofy, childlike yeti Gustav.
• Kanga of Disney's Winnie the Pooh adaptations. While even the sanest males such as Rabbit and Eeyore have frequent moments of naivete and brainlessness, Kanga usually holds the Sanity Ball and acts as a Team Mom to the other animals outside of unindividual acts of bumbling by the entire cast (a possible reason she is Out of Focus due to most stories focusing on misunderstandings and blundering). The original novels' Kanga was also slightly saner, but a bit more idiot-prone.
• Zak Storm: Being the most rational minded of the crew, first mate Cece, who is also the only girl in the crew, often acts as the voice of reason.