Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist / Western Animation

• Allen Gregory: Allen and his father Richard. Allen constantly hits on the principal (who is an obese 60-year-old woman), insults his teacher, is heavily condescending, and lashes out against his sister and his father's life partner. Richard is a complete attention seeker like Allen is and is even more so if any of that attention is on his life partner, Jeremy. Richard is also never wrong, despite what everyone else tells him.
• The Amazing World of Gumball: Zig-zagged with Gumball Watterson himself who is a terribly self-centered guy whose focus is to be the center of attention or get something by petty means and often the butt of the jokes made. Other times, however, he does have a genuine desire to help others and don't mean any harm to anyone. There's also the middle ground where he helps others for selfish goals or is just completely indifferent to a situation.
• American Dad!
  • Subtly deconstructed with Stan Smith. If you pay attention, Stan's recurring fear (other than seagulls) is if his friends and family still actually love him or not.
  • Roger Smith. In one early episode, it's revealed that because of his alien physiology, he has to treat people like crap. Acting nice would literally kill him.
• Animaniacs:
  • The Warners typically averted this, as the gloves only really came off in the presence of genuine Jerkasses. However, they did have their moments, such as humiliating and even stripping Otto von Schnitzelpusskrakengescheitmeyer (who was actually a Nice Guy) until he kicks them out in "Schnitzelbank", or letting an Expy of Polly Purebred get eaten by a shark in "Back in Style".
  • Slappy Squirrel generally doesn't care whether or not the antagonists deserve what they go through (although fortunately, most of the time they do), a fact that the Warners used to get rid of an annoying nanny who technically wasn't doing anything wrong. She's also cranky and sarcastic. Don't be fooled, though, she does have a soft side, particularly for her nephew Skippy.
    Slappy: If I were a better person, I'd ignore her and go on with my life... But I'm not! [laughs smugly]
• Archer: Just about everyone in the main cast, which includes:
  • Sterling Archer, a selfish, vain, childish, alcoholic nymphomaniac man child who screws up pretty much everything he can and treats everyone around him like crap,
  • Lana Kane, who despite often being the Only Sane Man, is a shockingly petty person willing to let her fellow agents be brutally beaten and tortured in front of her due to snippiness or insulting her fashion, not to mention MASSIVE anger management issues that often result in committing those acts herself,
  • Cyril Figgis, who despite often being portrayed as the relatively moral one, is still a nymphomaniac who has killed several innocent people through his recklessness as an agent,
  • Malory Archer, a racist, elitist Bad Boss responsible for numerous acts of treason against the United States whose abusive parenting is the reason Archer is so messed up and who is arguably the primary conflict creator throughout the series,
  • Cheryl Tunt, a probably clinically insane Psychopathic Manchild who gets off not only on getting the shit beaten out of her but also on taunting others to do the same in addition to being a repeat arsonist,
  • Pam Poovey, a violent-tempered Depraved Bisexual heroin addict who has killed people in underground bum-fights and raped Cyril several times,
  • Dr. Algernop Krieger, a deranged Mad Scientist who tapes bum fights, experiments on people without their consent, freely sells ISIS weapons to gangs and criminals to fund his lab operations, denies he's a... serial killer, and may or may not actually be a clone of Adolf Hitler,
  • Woodhouse, a heroin addict whose method of "raising" Archer was shown in Season 4 to involve much of the same mistreatment Archer heaps on him now,
  • And Ray Gilette, who while usually the Only Sane Man has still done his fair share of bad things, like faking paralysis twice and is implied to have raped Cyril numerous times
• Aqua Teen Hunger Force: Everyone is willing to kill, steal, or cheat for whatever reason the plot demands that episode.
• Beavis and Butt-Head: Beavis and Butt-Head are both deliberately rude, childish, and insensitive to everyone they meet.
• BoJack Horseman: The titular character is a narcissistic, alcoholic Jerkass willing to go to criminal lengths for his fragile ego. However, the show is a huge Genre Deconstruction of the Animated Shock Comedy, so Bojack's behavior is later shown to stem from a Dark and Troubled Past and ultimately ends up torpedoing his entire life and taking several others with him, sometimes to the grave.
• The Boondocks: Robert Freeman and his grandson Riley. Robert is a greedy womanizer who habitually uses corporal punishment against Riley, a juvenile delinquent who frequently gets himself into big trouble. The other grandson Huey has to put up with his brother's and grandfather's antics, which often cause them a hell lot of problems.
• Brickleberry: Pretty much the entire main cast. From all outward appearances, it seemed like Malloy would be the only unsympathetic cast member (or at the very least, Woody and Malloy) while the rest are mostly sane with some character flaws, but after a few episodes, viewers do see that most, if not all, of the main characters (and some side and one-shot characters, like Dr. Kuzniak, Bobby the redneck, and Flamey the bear) are some of the worst/most depraved people ever.
• CatDog: The eponymous conjoined brothers. The former is a greedy, arrogant Jerkass willing to take advantage of his brother for what he wants, while the latter is a reckless, thoughtless moron whose penchant for causing mayhem leads to endless suffering for his brother.
• Claymation Comedy of Horrors: Wilshire Pig wants to steal Dr. Frankenswine's monster and use him to conquer the world. In A Claymation Easter, he kidnaps the Easter Bunny so he can replace him and make a fortune from endorsements.
• Dan Vs.: Dan. He's a short-tempered, self-centered, vengeance-obsessed lunatic. The only thing that even comes close to making him sympathetic is the occasional Pet the Dog moment and that the guys he seeks revenge on are sometimes worse than he is.
• Daria: Daria Morgendorffer. She's outright bitchy to everyone in existence, but the other people in the series are exaggerated stereotypes of annoying things found in high school and suburban America, so she's a much more justified example.
• Drawn Together: The entirety of the main cast. Running down the main character list, we have:
  • Captain Hero, the narcissistic superhero who rapes dead bodies and uses teenage girls as a shield against bullets, despite being impervious to them.
  • Foxxy Love, who, despite being the most normal, is still a total black slut who can't even turn down Al Roker. She even has a grandchild, despite being in her mid-twenties.
  • Xander, a video game character who isn't really a bad guy, just an extremely offensive gay stereotype.
  • Wooldoor Sockbat, an insane SpongeBob-esque cartoon character who has done many unforgivable things over the course of the series.
  • Spanky Ham, an internet porn pig who regularly bullies Wooldoor, kills animals, enslaves immigrants, and escapes all punishment with flatulence.
  • Princess Clara, a girl who starts off as an oblivious racist and homophobic Disney princess, and gradually grows worse over time.
  • Toot, who, after being unable to become the sex symbol of the house due to changing standards of beauty, decides to become "the bitch".
  • Ling Ling, a psychotic Pokémon-esque being who killed/mercilessly attacked his master and uses skulls as sex toys.
• Duckman: The title character (voiced by Jason Alexander) is an unapologetic asshole. a completely sleazy pervert, and just a rotten dad. However, it's shown time and again while he often deserves what's coming to him, he is a sad, lonely guy who never got over the death of his wife who wasn't actually dead.
• Dungeons & Dragons (1983): Eric the Cavalier, for a given value of Unsympathetic Comedy Protagonist. Since Moral Guardians and Executive Meddling meant that nothing good could ever really happen to him until he relented and went along with the group, he was definitely meant to be unsympathetic, even though he was the most sympathetic character in the show because he was the only one reacting realistically to their situation, and many of the bad things that happen to him are distinctly slapstick, since he has to survive to agree to go along with the group's plans later.
• Ed, Edd n Eddy: Eddy is always out for people's money. He scams the other kids constantly and even treats his own friends like crap. The Grand Finale reveals that his attitude was all an act to impress his older brother, who's even worse.
• Family Guy:
  • Peter Griffin. He constantly undermines his wife (who, herself, isn't too fine and dandy of a character either), scolds Chris when he finds out he has a larger penis than him, constantly bullies and mistreats his own daughter, and has apparently put all of his kids in a coma while hiding it from his wife and not taking them to a hospital.
  • Lois isn't any better than Peter. She acts like a jerkass to her own children, especially Meg.
  • Possibly Glenn Quagmire too. Actually, there isn't a single member of the main cast who hasn't been Flanderized into being a Jerkass aside from Stewie, who ironically Took a Level in Kindness.
  • Brian Griffin has especially become this really badly after his death and revival. His worst actions include almost raping his best friend's wife, screwing underage teenagers, murdering a little girl's parents to stop them from calling the cops, and giving herpes to several people, including Chris and Stewie, for absolutely no reason whatsoever.
• The Flintstones: Fred Flintstone is short-tempered, childish, and is more concerned with having fun than raising his child(ren).
• Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends: Bloo (post-Pilot) follows this to a T. In general, Bloo's ill-behaved, greedy, hypocritical, selfish, aggressive, willing to throw his friends under the bus, and is even rather unfriendly!
• Frisky Dingo: Xander Crews. Probably moreso than the "villain", Killface. Of course, Killface may be the protagonist of the series. But pretty much every character fits this trope anyway!
• Futurama: Bender — "Bite my shiny metal ass." Most of the main cast have strong Jerkass tendencies, actually, except for Fry and Zoidberg, though even they occasionally have their moments.
• The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy: All three main characters. Mandy is a Villain Protagonist who, despite having no supernatural powers, is evil enough to terrify most beings who do. Grim, though generally a Nice Guy, is still The Grim Reaper, and not afraid to murder people when the urge strikes him. Billy, while ostensibly the Token Good Teammate, would come off as quite a Jerkass in almost any other team, only seeming like the good guy because the other two are so evil.
• Harley Quinn (2019): Harley Quinn is not just a supervillain, but also one who is incredibly reckless and refuses to listen to her friend's advice, though the unsympathetic part gets subverted as the series goes on, what with the Joker revealing how low he's willing to sink just to get back at Harley for wounding his pride and her own parents trying to kill her to collect her bounty. While a lot of her misery is her own fault, her actual misery progressively stops being Played for Laughs.
• Hey Arnold!: Helga G. Pataki. She's often abrasive and gives others (especially Arnold, her secret crush) a hard time. However, many of her flaws stem from an unhappy childhood as The Un-Favourite. Often times, she still remains the Only Sane Man among classmates, lamenting their stupidity.
• Home Movies: Coach McGuirk seems to regard himself as a father figure to Brendan, but he's a beer-swilling lout who dispenses lots of spurious advice.
• Hoops has Ben Hopkins. He is a crass, foul-mouthed high school basketball coach with very few redeeming qualities. He is a rude, hot headed and self-serving man, bitter about his failings in life and willing to use everyone, even those that look up to him, to get his goals.
• Invader Zim: Zim is trying to conquer/destroy the Earth and everything on it, but because (in Gaz's words) "he's so bad at it", his machinations are more amusing than mortifying. Being a Large Ham doesn't hurt.
• Jimmy Two-Shoes: Heloise and, to a lesser extent, Beezy. Heloise is a sadistic scientist who works for Lucius Heinous VII, while Beezy is a lazy, idiotic hedonist, making Jimmy the Token Good Teammate.
• Johnny Bravo: Johnny is a Too Dumb to Live Casanova Wannabe, though he does have some decent points. His stupidity was more apparent in later seasons than in the first season.
• KaBlam!: June. While she's quite likable and has a big heart underneath her cute but tough, snarky exterior, it's not uncommon for her to give her best friend / implied crush Henry hell — whether he deserves it or not. While her Jerkass qualities tend to vary from writer to writer - and the cake scenes are from season 3, in which she Took a Level in Jerkass (but was toned down for season 4) — she more than qualifies for this trope.
• King of the Hill:
  • Hank Hill can wander into this territory, especially in regards to his son, who he sometimes seems to think is completely worthless, for no reason other than being different from Hank.
  • His wife Peggy also takes the reins, seeing herself as the smartest person in any given situation and thereby rightfully the one who should be in charge, even if it was her actions (that she'll refuse to admit) that started said situation. Peggy is/was a substitute Spanish teacher, who doesn't know Spanish (well, she could say words, but not in the correct order, phrasing or usage) and an entire episode was devoted to how that was the cause of and also the reason for her release from prison.
• The Life & Times of Tim: Tim. A slight twist in that he isn't a character who goes out looking for awful things to do, but in almost every single episode he goes along unquestioningly with the awful things that his friends do and then gets surprised that it gets him into trouble.
• Looney Tunes:
  • Daffy Duck was the original screwball character of the series, causing much pain to Porky whenever the two were paired together. Then his character changed, and he became the Butt-Monkey Jerkass who would invariably end up humiliated thanks to his temper and ego. Of course, in cases like Drip-Along Daffy, he'd end up fighting antagonists who weren't any better.
    • The Looney Tunes Show mixes up Daffy's Cloudcuckoolander personality from the earlier cartoons with his Jerkass tendencies from latter, creating an even more unsympathetic, egoistical protagonist who treats his peers - friends and antagonists alike - very horrible thanks to and is oblivious to the most common things at the same time.
  • In his early days, Bugs Bunny was more proactive, and liked to screw with people (particularly Elmer Fudd) whether or not they did anything to provoke him. In some shorts, such as Buckaroo Bugs or Rebel Rabbit, he was an outright Villain Protagonist. A rule was eventually established that Bugs could only act in retaliation, although he still fell into this territory on a few occasions.
  • Foghorn Leghorn, the quintessential Motor Mouthed prankster who had no problem picking on the Barnyard Dawg, who typically wasn't doing anything to him until then.
• Capn' K'nuckles from The Marvelous Misadventures of Flapjack frequently gives Flapjack horrible advice despite being the closest he has to a father figure, argues with Bubbie, acts like a Dirty Coward when in danger, and is very lazy (to the point of once holding the title for laziest man in Stormalong Harbor).
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic: On her bad days, Rainbow Dash can be this. Examples include the episode "The Mysterious Mare-Do-Well" where she's little more than a loudmouth braggart who can't back up her boasts and the episode "28 Pranks Later" where... well, let's just say she had it coming.
• Neo Yokio: Kaz is a jerk to many of his friends and generally to anyone who needs anything from him. He dislikes having to work despite his family depending on him and only begrudgingly accepts requests when forced by his aunt, complaining during the whole time and when he faces drama, he acts with so many levels of Wangst that it's hard to care or even not laugh at him.
• Paradise PD: With the exception of Kevin, the people in Paradise PD are all morally screwed-up individuals who simply have their own interests in mind when doing their duties.
• The Penguins of Madagascar:
  • King Julien is selfish, vain, and treats Maurice and Mort (especially the latter) like crap. Even on his best days, he's a Jerk with a Heart of Gold with emphasis on the "jerk".
  • The penguins themselves (sans Private). Skipper is the paranoid Deadpan Snarker leader, Rico is Ax-Crazy with a fondness for explosives, and Kowalski is an arrogant Insufferable Genius who does experiments that put his friends in danger.
• Pepper Ann: Pepper Ann is a self-absorbed jerk who is always causing trouble. Some good examples include "Dances with Ignorance", "Impractical Jokers", "Greensleeves", "Unicycle of Life", "Megablades of Grass", and "TGIF". If the characters are blunt enough about her unpleasant behavior, we can at least rest assured that she won't make the same mistake twice.
• The Ren & Stimpy Show: Ren is a greedy, ill-tempered Jerkass who constantly beats up his best friend Stimpy. It's dialed up in the Adult Party Cartoon, where he's shown to abuse animals for fun.
• Both Gus and Wally from Rocket Monkeys, especially Gus often have these roles. Both are seen by almost everyone as nothing but nuisances who make everyone miserable. In "It's a Rocket Monkey Christmas" it's even proven that most characters would be better off if neither of them ever existed.
• Scaredy Squirrel: The entire main cast (except for Dave, Mildrid, and Hatton) constantly push around others and put themselves before anyone else.
• Sidekick: Everyone is a Jerkass with almost no concern for those around them.
• The Simpsons:
  • Homer Simpson and Bart Simpson. Homer is often abusive towards his wife and children and his reckless stupidity causes many of the problems on the show. Bart is a mischievous self-admitted hellion who often causes misery to those closest to him.
  • Itchy of the in-universe cartoon series The Itchy & Scratchy Show is just Jerry taken to psychotic extremes since every episode of the show involves him killing Scratchy in ridiculously violent and gory ways for no reason other than because it's funny.
    Homer: (while watching The Itchy and Scratchy Movie) Which one's the mouse?
    Bart: Itchy.
    Homer: Itchy's a jerk.
    Bart: (laughs) Yeah.
• South Park:
  • Eric Cartman is a Villain Protagonist who is willing to do things like feed a kid his own parents or even cause the end of the world to get revenge for minor wrongdoings against him. Most people in South Park are a lesser version of this trope.
  • Second to Cartman is Randy Marsh, who more and more regularly gets himself and often his family (or even the entire town, starting with joining the PC bro fraternity) involved in some narcissistic driven need for attention because he believes he's smarter than he actually is (more so in the last five years or so, as in early seasons he was often a voice of reason to the kids or situation, except in instances where being an idiot adult and ignoring the smarter child was funny, only being an outside witness to the events instead of the instigator).
• SpongeBob SquarePants:
  • Mr. Krabs, especially in post-movie episodes.
  • As of post-movie episodes, SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star can be seen as this Depending on the Writer. However, they are more Innocently Insensitive than jerks. Sometimes, they unintentionally pester and cause pain to other characters (Squidward and Mrs. Puff for example), and rarely get their comeuppance for their actions.
• Early Cuyler on Squidbillies. He's a short-tempered, racist Gun Nut with strong sociopathic tendencies and a complete inability to learn from his actions. He also commits violent crimes (up to and including murder) on the regular.
• Superjail!:
  • The Warden. He goes from ultraviolent sadistic Cloudcuckoolander to potentially becoming an ultra-violent sadistic Nazi-esque overlord in a possible future — just in the space of ten episodes. He spends most of the first season drunk, sick, oblivious to everything around him, angrily berating and abusing his assistant for not properly honoring him, terrifying his staff and inmates alike, giving birth to grotesque manifestations of his inner child through his anus, and following sex-crazed alien cult leaders around. Of course, the viewers don't mind this at all. He's toned down a bit in the later seasons, becoming more of a simple Manchild but still causes trouble for the jail, such as burning it down in the season 3 finale.
  • Alice can also be seen as this, as even if she does have an unfortunate backstory and a kinder moment here and there, she's also admittedly described as a "sadistic bully" by the creators, and will abuse her power to force inmates to have sex with her as well as also bullying Jared.
  • Basically all the cast have elements of this, even Jared here and there.
• Teen Titans Go!: The team themselves, which exaggerates their traits from the original 2003 series; Robin is an obsessed control freak whose leadership is often ridiculed, Beast Boy and Cyborg are idiots with very stubborn streaks in their recklessness and Raven is much snarkier than before and even willing to put her friends in harm's way on a few occasions. Starfire somewhat averts this as mostly her naïveté is played up and usually when she does any action, it's not for a selfish reason.
• Tom and Jerry: Both Tom and Jerry themselves are this. The former is a Super-Persistent Predator who would throw the first punch at times and, on occasions, has tormented Jerry just for kicks, and the latter, while usually attacking Tom out of self-defense, has also tormented Tom for no other reason other than to see him suffer and/or took his retaliation towards said cat too far.
• Tripping the Rift:
  • Chode, the Captain of the Jupiter42, is ugly, crude, disgusting, sarcastic, depraved, and his crew never misses a moment to lampshade it. Even his own name sounds much like the stretch of flesh between the testicles and asshole, which is where his mentality seems to reside.
  • The rest of the crew aren't exactly sympathetic either. Apart from Six who, ironically as she's an android, is the only one who seems to actually have a heart and a brain, in addition to a lot of common sense. As a matter of fact, most sex droids on this show tend to be built to be remarkably smarter than their owners.
• Velma: The titular character, Velma Dinkley. While she is somewhat justified in thinking she's the smartest person in any given room, she's also a judgmental, arrogant asshole who treats everyone around her like garbage. She'll occasionally have a Jerkass Realization and begrudgingly apologize for mistreating her friends, but the audience shouldn't expect any lessons about empathy or humility to last even five minutes, much less into the next episode.
• The Venture Bros.: Rusty Venture fits the trope perfectly. Greedy and selfish, the Brilliant, but Lazy super scientist regularly neglects his sons as well as takes them around the world on dangerous adventures. The bigger reason why he is so neglectful is that he knows that when they die (they have died a LOT) he can just clone new ones. He does become much more protective once he loses his backup clones.
• The original portrayal of Woody Woodpecker was a manic screwball who took great pleasure in causing trouble for others without any particular reason. This got toned down by The '50s.

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