Times where The Chosen One Missed the Call in Western Animation.
- A brilliant one in Archie's Weird Mysteries that combines with a Prophecy Twist. The three-part vampire arc has Veronica as the ender of a Vampire Lord after Archie's guess that a girl called Scarlet is the one seems to be wrong. As it turns out, despite being a vampire and a loyal servant of the Vampire Lord, Scarlet was the true ender and Archie was right all along. A line from the prophesy was misinterpreted:Veronica: "Raven and red upon their heads. Destiny awakens. One girl is the ender. While another is mistaken."
- Ben 10:
- Three seasons after the Omnitrix has bonded with Ben, it's revealed that it was actually intended for Grandpa Max. The only reason they can't fix this is that the Omnitrix can't be removed from its host. In the multiple Sequel Series, this aspect of the Omnitrix has been retconned and it's now easy to remove, but in exchange, they made it an Empathic Weapon that just decided it liked Ben better and will only work for him now.
- In the Original Series What If? episode "Gwen 10", Ben is the one who misses the call, having been mysteriously subject to Mental Time Travel, going back to just before he got the Omnitrix. Through his meddling, he accidentally makes it so that Gwen gets the Omnitrix instead of him (which pisses him off to no end, especially since she is immediately far more competent with it than he ever was). Ironically, by the end of the episode, Vilgax manages to remove the Omnitrix from Gwen and it winds up on Grandpa Max, its intended owner. Also, Omniverse shows that there is at least one Alternate Universe where Gwen does get the Omnitrix.
- Sissi of Code Lyoko gets a nasty one in "X.A.N.A. Awakens" pre-sequel. In that episode, it was Sissi, not Yumi, who found the factory with the others. She even planned on entering the "game" later, but before she did XANA got loose for the first time, and Sissi tattled because this was getting too real. As a result, the whole group was nearly arrested, and the others unsurprisingly agreed to keep her in the dark after returning to the past. Sadly, Ulrich decides to be a jerk to Sissi about it even though she doesn't remember what her mistake was, resulting in her becoming the group's Alpha Bitch nemesis for a good long while.
- Somehow, The Fairly OddParents! plays this straight, lampshades it, then subverts it in the Wishology trilogy. Played straight at the end of Part One, where Turbo Thunder is revealed to have been the one apparently chosen but missed the call because he was asleep when the Darkness returned. This is lampshaded throughout most of Part Two, mostly by Timmy trying to send the bad guys after Turbo Thunder instead. It's subverted near the end of Part Two when it turns out that Timmy really is the chosen one.
- Kim Possible's first adventure was in response to a call intended for Team Impossible, a group of heroes for hire. In one episode, Team Impossible, annoyed that her helping people free of charge cuts into their business, tries to force her to quit.
- In the Demographic-Dissonant Crossover between Supernatural & Scooby-Doo, Scoobynatural, the Winchesters reveal the existence of the actual paranormal to Mystery Inc. None of them take it well, but while the others are suffering existential crises, Fred sees it as this trope and angrily bangs his head against a tree repeatedly.Fred: "We've been stopping real estate developers when we could've been hunting Dracula?! Are you kidding me? My life is meaningless!"
