History FromNobodyToNightmare / WesternAnimation

* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'': While it's not dwelt on much in the show, [[Characters/GravityFallsBillCipher Bill Cipher]] was apparently once an ordinary inhabitant of a TwoDSpace AlternateDimension, which he [[WhereIWasBornAndRazed then destroyed]] after having "too many bad days." From a meta-perspective, his first appearance in "Dreamscaperers" had him in the position of the VillainOfTheWeek, and he was seemingly defeated at the end of it, before his appearances in later episodes suggested that he had a bigger role to play in the story.

** Even the main antagonist, [[BigBad Mojo Jojo]] (Jojo) was originally a chimpanzee that Professor Utonium kept in his lab for some reason. When he caused a ruckus that lead to him getting blasted by Chemcial X, Jojo gained super-intelligence and snuck away to begin his villainy. After successfully conning the Powerpuff Girls into helping him develop his base and acquiring more Chemical X, Jojo then mutates a whole zoo's worth of monkeys and apes before using the last of the chemical to turn himself into a King Kong Copy. Considering [[UnstoppableRage Fuzzy Lumpkins]], [[TeensAreMonsters the Gangreen Gang]] and the Amoeba Boys never got very far while [[Satan HIM]] and [[SpoiledBrat Princess Morbucks]] already had the resources they needed, it's safe to say Mojo Jojo has earned his status as the Powerpuff Girls' greatest foe.

* [[Deuteragonist Isaac]] from ''WesternAnimation/Castlevania2017''. His backstory has him start out as a slave. By the end of the season, he’s wiping out entire bands of slavers and adding them to an army of slaves he has planned. And by the end of the series, Isaac defeats Carmilla and is now ruler of Styria.

* ''WesternAnimation/BigCityGreens'':
** [[Characters/BigCityGreensChipWhistler Chip Whistler]] is a mild example. By the point we meet him, he's the manager of Wholesome Foods and the son of the CEO. But after getting his tooth chipped, he starts like a "joke" like Cricket would call him, he goes from an incompetent guy whose only intentions are making the Greens have a bad day to a monstrous businessman who threatens to destroy the legacy of the Greens. In season 1, he was more like a bully/nuisance for the Greens and Gloria, his plans included trying to steal a coffee bag from Cricket and Gloria out of pettiness and waging a food war with Cricket, which culminates in him pelting Cricket with produce even after he surrendered and when this fails he tries to eat the Green family produce so they can't sell anthing. Then in season 2, he manages to fake kindness to trick his dad and the Greens into believing he changed for the good and uses his newfound CEO power to rid the Greens out of Big City for good. Not only in latest appearance he leaves Gloria jobless and many innocent people homeless for his revenge (his plan is to build another "Wholesome Foods" supermarket in the street the Green family live and turn the family's home into a parking lot, out of spite to them), [[spoiler: but he also makes fake petitions so he can destroy their house and makes the Greens belive that Big City hates them, imprisons Nancy again when she tries to fight back and even after his plan is foiled and gets banned from Big City forever, he attempts to murder the Green family with the blades of his helicopter as a last ditch effort, since he had nothing to lose]].

* ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'':
** Henchman 21 starts out as an overweight MauveShirt who's ''only'' valuable asset is his JokerImmunity and a little bit of [[GenreSavvy Genre Savvy-ness]]. Then his only friend 24 is killed right before his eyes and he undergoes TrainingFromHell to become [[TheDragon Two-Ton 21]]: a huge, muscle-bound man who can put up a decent fight against (and even earn the respect of) ''[[WorldsBestWarrior Brock Samson]]''.

[[caption-width-right:350:This is what happens when [[Music/ImagineDragons everyone wants to be your enemy]].]]

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** John Dee, a prison inmate with delusions of grandeur in the episode "[[Recap/{{JusticeLeagueS2E5And6OnlyADream}} Only a Dream]]", follows this trope when he becomes Doctor Destiny. Batman, being GenreSavvy and who had dealt with several nobodies who became nightmares, investigates him precisely because he is a nobody.

** John Dee, a prison inmate with delusions of grandeur in the episode "[[Recap/{{JusticeLeagueS2E5And6OnlyADream}} Only a Dream]]", follows this trope when he becomes Doctor Destiny. Batman, being GenreSavvy and who had delt with several nobodies who became nightmares, investigates him precisely because he is a nobody.

** John Dee, a prison inmate with delusions of grandeur in the episode "[[Recap/{{JusticeLeagueS2E5And6OnlyADream}} Only a Dream]]", follows this trope when he becomes Doctor Destiny. Batman, being GenreSavvy, investigates him precisely because he is a nobody.

*** In his fake backstory, Amon was just the son of a farmer who was badly burned by a rogue firebender who killed the rest of his family, and after WalkingTheEarth was chosen by the spirits to receive the power to [[AntiMagic take away someone's bending]]. In his ''actual'' backstory [[spoiler:he was a young waterbender named Noatak, whose father was once an infamous criminal. When Noatak started developing waterbending abilities, his father forced him and his brother Tarrlok to learn the forbidden art of bloodbending. After years of such training, Noatak was fed up with it and ran away from home, convinced that all bending was evil, even implying that he contained self-loathing for being a bender]]. He would eventually form the Equalists, who sought to rid the world of benders and tore Republic City apart, socially and politically.

*** In her backstory, Kuvira was an abandoned child taken in by Suyin, later becoming Suyin's apprentice. In Season 3, Kuvira was first established in the series as an occasionally seen MauveShirt and Suyin's [[NumberTwo security chief]]. In Season 4, she's the BigBad, a KnightTemplar at the head of a massive, well-organized army bent on forcing the fractured Earth Kingdom back together, [[spoiler:a mission which includes reconquering the United Republic, a now separate nation that was originally part of the Earth Kingdom]].

** [[JerkWithAHeartOfJerk Chip]] [[BigBad Whistler]] is a mild example. By the point we meet him, he's the manager of Wholesome Foods and the son of the CEO. But after getting his tooth chipped, he starts like a "joke" like Cricket would call him, he goes from an incompetent guy whose only intentions are making the Greens have a bad day to a monstrous businessman who threatens to destroy the legacy of the Greens. In season 1, he was more like a bully/nuisance for the Greens and Gloria, his plans included trying to steal a coffee bag from Cricket and Gloria out of pettiness and waging a food war with Cricket, which culminates in him pelting Cricket with produce even after he surrendered and when this fails he tries to eat the Green family produce so they can't sell anthing. Then in season 2, he manages to fake kindness to trick his dad and the Greens into believing he changed for the good and uses his newfound CEO power to rid the Greens out of Big City for good. Not only in latest appearance he leaves Gloria jobless and many innocent people homeless for his revenge (his plan is to build another "Wholesome Foods" supermarket in the street the Green family live and turn the family's home into a parking lot, out of spite to them), [[spoiler: but he also makes fake petitions so he can destroy their house and makes the Greens belive that Big City hates them, imprisons Nancy again when she tries to fight back and even after his plan is foiled and gets banned from Big City forever, he attempts to murder the Green family with the blades of his helicopter as a last ditch effort, since he had nothing to lose]].

* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'': While it's not dwelt on much in the show, [[EldritchAbomination Bill Cipher]] was apparently once an ordinary inhabitant of a TwoDSpace AlternateDimension, which he [[WhereIWasBornAndRazed then destroyed]] after having "too many bad days." From a meta-perspective, his first appearance in "Dreamscaperers" had him in the position of the VillainOfTheWeek, and he was seemingly defeated at the end of it, before his appearances in later episodes suggested that he had a bigger role to play in the story.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'': Emperor Belos, the evil overlord of the Boiling Isles, started his life as [[spoiler:Philip Wittebane, a 17th century human who became trapped on the Isles when he followed his brother Caleb there. Both of them were raised as {{Witch Hunter}}s, but while Caleb saw the good in the denizens of the Boiling Isles, Philip remained steadfast in his conviction that all witches are evil and need to be eradicated, even if he had to use magic himself to do so. After finding out that Caleb married and had a child with a witch woman, [[SiblingMurder Philip stabbed Caleb to death]], and with the help of the Collector, devised a plan to [[FinalSolution commit mass genocide]] on every witch on the Boiling Isles. Through fearmongering and other trickery, he formed a cult that would eventually become the Emperor's Coven, eventually taking over the entire Isles. By the time he finally set his plan into motion, the people he was there to kill worshiped him as a god.]]

*** Hama started out as a normal waterbender from the Southern Tribe, but after being imprisoned by the Fire Nation, she developed a truly ''terrifying'' new skill -- bloodbending (manipulating another beings bodily fluids) -- that she used to exact revenge on her enemies. Her last act was to pass on her abilities to Katara (much to the latter's horror).

** [[TheDragon Azula]] figured [[EvilChancellor Long Feng]] out from the get-go. The latter started out as the son of a middle-class merchant. With hard work and careful [[TheChessmaster manipulations,]] he took over the [[SecretPolice Dai Li,]] turned the Earth King into a political figurehead, and became the Big Brother-like ruler of the entire Earth Kingdom. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for him, this came back to bite him when Azula convinced his minions that [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech a ruler that works for power is inferior]] to a ruler who's ''born'' with it. He lost at his own game. Or, in Azula's words, he was never even a player.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/StaticShock'': Ivan Evans was a thug who was desperate to break into major crime and join the big leagues. Then the Big Bang happened, and he became Ebon, Static's ArchEnemy. [[spoiler:That's why, when a cure is found, he tries to get his powers back -- he doesn't want to be a nobody again]].
* ''WesternAnimation/TangledTheSeries'': The first season BigBad is Varian, a somewhat [[DitzyGenius ditzy]] GadgeteerGenius humorously placed in a fantasy setting. He was an ally of Rapunzel and helped her try to solve the mystery of the black rocks...but in the process of his experiments, accidentally trapped [[WellDoneSonGuy his father]] in a giant block of unbreakable amber. The royal family kept putting him off, and he became more and more unhinged as his own attempts failed.
* In ''WesternAnimation/TeenTitans'' Johnny Rancid was the lowest tier criminal to ever appear; just a violent jerk with a motorcycle and a small laser gun. Then he gets the power to [[RealityWarper rewrite the rules of reality]] and turns the world into a gothic hellscape.

* Henchman 21 from ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'' starts out as an overweight MauveShirt who's ''only'' valuable asset is his JokerImmunity and a little bit of [[GenreSavvy Genre Savvy-ness]]. Then his only friend 24 is killed right before his eyes and he undergoes TrainingFromHell to become [[TheDreaded Two-Ton 21]]: a huge, muscle-bound man who can put up a decent fight against (and even earn the respect of) ''Brock Samson''.
--> '''Brock Samson:''' Well, I'll hand it to you, you really can deliver a pretty decent beating.

--->'''Dee's wife:''' John? What are you doing here? Get out!
--->'''John Dee:''' Y'know, I never liked that name. It's so... ordinary. Especially for someone with such big things in store. You know, a destiny? Ooh, I like that. DR. Destiny. What do you think?
--->'''Dee's wife:''' I think you're crazy!
--->'''John Dee (transforming into Dr. Destiny):''' Maybe. Or maybe you're just seeing the real me. And now that I'm a doctor... (turns into a grinning skull) [[PreMortemOneLiner I think I'll]] [[NothingIsScarier perform some surgery]].
** Another ''WesternAnimation/JusticeLeague'' example: David Clinton, an inventor from the ''WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond'' era who appeared in the first season finale of ''Unlimited''. After single-handedly creating a time travel suit, he started building a collection of historical artifacts. At first, he only took things that wouldn't be missed, but after spending six months as the prisoner of a Wild West thug he went flying off the deep end. He used technology from the future to make a League-killing army of the Jokerz and filled Gotham with stolen landmarks from other time periods, polluting history so much that time itself started unraveling.

* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'': While it's not dwelt on much in the show, [[EldritchAbomination Bill Cipher]] was apparently once an ordinary inhabitant of a TwoDSpace AlternateDimension, which he [[WhereIWasBornAndRazed then destroyed]] after having "too many bad days."

* ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'': Emperor Belos, the evil overlord of the Boiling Isles, started his life as [[spoiler:Philip Wittebane, a 17th century human who became trapped on the Isles when he followed his brother Caleb there. Both of them were raised as {{Witch Hunter}}s, but while Caleb saw the good in the denizens of the Boiling Isles, Philip remained steadfast in his conviction that all witches are evil and need to be eradicated, even if he had to use magic himself to do so. After finding out that Caleb married and had a child with a witch woman, [[SiblingMurder Philip stabbed Caleb to death]], and with the help of the Collector, devised a plan to [[FinalSolution commit mass genocide]] on every witch on the Boiling Isles.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'': [[TheDragon Azula]] figured [[EvilChancellor Long Feng]] out from the get-go. The latter started out as the son of a middle-class merchant. With hard work and careful [[TheChessmaster manipulations,]] he took over the [[SecretPolice Dai Li,]] turned the Earth King into a political figurehead, and became the Big Brother-like ruler of the entire Earth Kingdom. [[spoiler: Unfortunately for him, this came back to bite him when Azula convinced his minions that [[TheReasonYouSuckSpeech a ruler that works for power is inferior]] to a ruler who's ''born'' with it. He lost at his own game. Or, in Azula's words, he was never even a player.]]
** Hama started out as a normal waterbender from the Southern Tribe, but after being imprisoned by the Fire Nation, she developed a truly ''terrifying'' new skill -- bloodbending (manipulating another beings bodily fluids) -- that she used to exact revenge on her enemies. Her last act was to pass on her abilities to Katara (much to the latter's horror).

* ''WesternAnimation/TheLegendOfKorra'':
** In his fake backstory, Amon was just the son of a farmer who was badly burned by a rogue firebender who killed the rest of his family, and after WalkingTheEarth was chosen by the spirits to receive the power to [[AntiMagic take away someone's bending]]. In his ''actual'' backstory [[spoiler:he was a young waterbender named Noatak, whose father was once an infamous criminal. When Noatak started developing waterbending abilities, his father forced him and his brother Tarrlok to learn the forbidden art of bloodbending. After years of such training, Noatak was fed up with it and ran away from home, convinced that all bending was evil, even implying that he contained self-loathing for being a bender]]. He would eventually form the Equalists, who sought to rid the world of benders and tore Republic City apart, socially and politically.
** For a heroic variant, [[spoiler:there's Wan, a petty thief who eventually became the first Avatar and the progenitor of the Avatar Cycle, essentially making him a god by fusing himself to the spirit of light and peace.]]
** In her backstory, Kuvira was an abandoned child taken in by Suyin, later becoming Suyin's apprentice. In Season 3, Kuvira was first established in the series as an occasionally seen MauveShirt and Suyin's [[NumberTwo security chief]]. In Season 4, she's the BigBad, a KnightTemplar at the head of a massive, well-organized army bent on forcing the fractured Earth Kingdom back together, [[spoiler:a mission which includes reconquering the United Republic, a now separate nation that was originally part of the Earth Kingdom]].

** Amon was [[spoiler: a young waterbender named Noatak, until his father, a former criminal, forced him and his brother Tarrlok to learn bloodbending. After years of such training, Noatak was fed up with it and ran away from home, convinced that all bending was evil, even implying that he contained self-loathing for being a bender]]. He would eventually form the Equalists, who sought to rid the world of benders and tore Republic City apart, socially and politically.
** For an heroic variant, [[spoiler: here's Wan, a petty thief who will eventually become the progenitor of the Avatar Cycle, essentially making him a god by fusing himself to the spirit of light and peace.]]
** In Season 3, Kuvira was a MauveShirt and Suyin's NumberTwo. In Season 4, she's the BigBad, a KnightTemplar at the head of a massive, well-organized army bent on forcing the fractured Earth Kingdom back together [[spoiler: and that includes the United Republic]].

** Hydro-Man in ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManTheAnimatedSeries''. According to him, he was a "nobody" and was expelled from school for causing a lot of trouble. His parents sent him to the navy where they hoped he would straighten up. During a voyage, he accidentally fell into ocean water tainted with some strange mist from a fissure which "turned [him] from a nothing... into a something!"
*** Numerous TAS villains fit. The Hobgoblin was a petty street thug who was granted superpowers by Norman Osborn and turned into a lethally dangerous PsychoForHire. Venom, aka Eddie Brock, was a failed reporter, before his acquisition of [[TheSymbiote the alien symbiote]] turned him into one of Spider-Man's worst enemies (his successor, Carnage, averts this, as Kletus Cassady was a MadBomber long before he got his symbiote). And then there's [[EvilTwin Spider-Carnage]]. Take a badly unhinged kid. Give him Spider-Man's powers. Then, after a long bout of emotional trauma involving clones and an identity crisis, attach the Carnage symbiote to him. Hello OmnicidalManiac.
*** The Kingpin. When Smythe asked about his past, he explained he was once a mobster's son named Moriarty Wilson (or Willie as he was called by his father). Because of his weight, he had no friends and his father considered him weak and useless. During adulthood, Willie tried to help his father in various crimes, with little success. On one robbery, he was forced to take the fall for his father, who then abandoned him. Now all alone, Willie realized that he was gonna have to learn to take of care himself if he was going to survive. Once out of jail, he had learned everything one needs to learn to become a criminal. Over the years, he created the greatest criminal empire on the East Coast with thousands of criminals working for him and now calls himself Wilson Fisk A.K.A. The Kingpin. And as both an attempt to sever his ties with the past as well as payback for his abandonment, he had his father brought to him so he could see with his own eyes what his son had become before being executed.