Unwitting Instigator Of Doom / Animated Films

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• Bolt: Mindy threatening to fire the director for the show getting bad ratings backfires horribly because it gives the director the idea of adding a cliffhanger making Bolt (who thinks the show is real) think Penny is in real danger leading to him getting lost in New York City while the show is forced to improvise with a replacement dog who is too afraid to do the role and accidentally sets the entire studio on fire with Penny still trapped inside.
• P.T. Flea from A Bug's Life got Flik and the circus bugs ostracized by the colony and then later in the film incinerated a fake bird, thinking it was the real deal. Earlier in the film he had also fired the circus bugs, leading to them meeting Flik and setting the plot in motion.
• Coraline has Wybie, who unknowingly gives Coraline the doll that allows the Other Mother to spy on her.
• Frozen has a few of these knocking about:
  • The whole main plot is caused by Hans's horse. It knocked into Anna, prompting her and Hans's meeting, which led to their engagement, which led to Elsa's bout of Power Incontinence and her panicking, fleeing, and burying Arendelle in snow. Of course, given what we learn of Hans later in the film, he may have arranged most of this; though he didn't know about Elsa's powers before they were revealed, he did his best to take advantage of the opportunities that arose.
  • Not helped by the fact that most of her emotional duress (as well as Anna's social awkwardness that Hans exploits) were the result of her parents shutting them away from the world in an attempt to control her powers, when really they just hid them and never focused on helping her learn to control them.
  • The trolls could count as well, as most of the sister's problems stem from a bad case of Poor Communication Kills. A lot of trouble could have been avoided if they had been a little more clear. Their proclamation that fear will be Elsa's greatest enemy was accompanied by a representation of what looked like angry townspeople attacking her (an honest concern), even though they meant her fear rather than the people's (which turned out to be even more dangerous).
  • In the semi-canon novelization A Frozen Heart, Prince Hans's plan to come to Arendelle in an attempt to marry Elsa was concocted by his brother Lars, who was the only member of his family aside from their mother to treat Hans fairly well. He thought Hans should be Elsa's suitor so that he could marry into another family and have an excuse to never come back to the Southern Isles. Unfortunately for Lars, Hans let his desire to be a king, years of abuse, and want for their father's respect get to him and things took the wrong turn.
• Gay Purr-ee: Jeanette was just telling her sister about how much she'd love life in Paris. How could she have known that Mewsette understood human speak? Regardless, thanks to that conversation, Mewsette decided to go to Paris herself in hopes of the glamour she sought, met Meowrice, and almost ended up shipped to the States as some guy's Mail-Order Bride.
• In Home (2015), during an attempted peace conference with the Gorg, Captain Smek ran and grabbed a small rock on the way out, placing it on his "shusher wand." It is later revealed that the rock actually contains the next generation of Gorg, which is the true reason the Gorg has been chasing the Boov.
• Both Gringoire and Djali serve as this in the Burbank Films Australia adaptation of The Hunchback of Notre Dame — firstly, Gringoire tells Frollo where Esmeralda is going, thus allowing the priest to find and stab Phoebus, then Djali performs a trick during Esmeralda's trial, thus "proving" the accusations of witchcraft. Luckily, disaster is averted when Quasimodo rescues Esmeralda.
• In The Incredibles, Buddy Pine is to blame for the Frivolous Lawsuit, Super Registration Act and everyone being forced into hiding. But in the end, he makes the Supers re-emerge and be hailed as heroes again, thanks to his failed scheme. This also carries onto Incredibles 2 where said Super Registration Act led to events that caused the villain's Start of Darkness.
• Inside Out:
  • Joy overriding Dream Productions by putting on a memory of Riley ice skating the first night of her move to San Francisco. While she means well, it inadvertently causes Riley to become nostalgic of Minnesota, which is implied to be reason why every memory of Minnesota she has afterwards turns sad (visualized by Sadness unconsciously touching them).
  • Related to the above, Riley's mother bidding her good night while telling her to stay a little more time being happy for her father. At this point, Joy is actually dawning on the realization that Riley shouldn't be happy, but this comment causes her to believe that, despite it all, Riley has to stay happy, leading to the aforementioned scene.
  • Anger frequently makes Joy and Sadness' journey back harder by making Riley overreact in ways that bring down several of the Islands of Personality, which they're trying to cross to get home. When he puts in the idea bulb to run away, not only does Honesty Island's resulting collapse bring down the Train of Thought, which Joy and Sadness were on at the time, but the idea also destabilizes Family Island before they can cross it, leaving them without any easy way home. As if that wasn't bad enough, when Anger finally sees Family Island crumbling and realizes it's a bad idea, he does so just in time for the console to lock out him, Disgust, and Fear from being able to stop Riley.
• During the climax of The Iron Giant, after the titular Giant resists its self-defensive programming and returns to town with Hogarth to prove it's not a threat, it gives corrupt government agent Kent Mansley a Death Glare. This spurs an already-panicking Mansley to forsake all common sense, snatch the radio from General Rogard and order that Nautilus launch a nuclear missile locked on to the Giant... who is approximately fifty feet away from him and in the middle of town, which would have resulted in not only the Giant's destruction, but the deaths of many innocent civilians and Mansley himself, had the Giant not performed a Heroic Sacrifice.
• The Jungle Book:
  • Bagheera tells Colonel Hathi about Mowgli running away, not knowing that a hidden Shere Khan is nearby listening in on the conversation, which alerts him that there is a man-cub in the jungle.
  • A similar incident happens just before the climax. Shere Khan overhears the vultures singing to Mowgli to cheer him up, and that draws him in to their presence. In both situations, Mowgli would have been safer if his friends had stayed silent.
• In Kung Fu Panda, Shifu's goose messenger to Tai Lung's prison gives him both the means to escape and the motivation to do so. Blame is also placed on the prison commander for dislodging the feather Tai Lung used to escape.
• In The Little Mermaid (1989), a seahorse herald ends up triggering part of the plot by telling Sebastian that King Triton wants to talk to him about Ariel. Despite Triton only wanting to speak to him about if Ariel's in love, Sebastian assumes he knew about her saving Prince Eric and ends up spilling the beans. This leads to King Triton confronting Ariel and destroying her collection of human objects to teach her a lesson. However, Ariel is left heartbroken, and since she's more prone to making rash decisions, Ursula's able to convince her to make a deal with her — which is all part of her master plan to get control of the trident.
• The Little Mermaid II: Return to the Sea: While Melody is getting ready for her birthday ball, she unknowingly puts on her belt with Sebastian still holding onto it, causing him to get stuck there; he eventually chews on the finger of the young boy Melody dances with, resulting in a case of Disaster Dominoes which causes the whole party to humorously fall apart.
• Oliver & Company: After Fagin notices Oliver's been adopted, he decides to hold him for ransom to get the money he owes Sykes, even telling the loanshark himself. When Jenny comes to get the cat back, Fagan decides not to take her piggy bank and returns Oliver for free, only for Sykes to kidnap her for ransom.
• Pocahontas: Two characters on opposite sides wind up having their actions with good intentions backfired in the absolute worst of ways.
  • Nakoma tells Kocoum about Pocahontas meeting John Smith precisely because she wants something to happen. But she was hoping Kocoum would bring Pocahontas home and stop her from fraternizing with the settlers. She certainly didn't expect Kocoum to witness a kiss, try to kill John in a blind rage and get shot by Thomas — thus leading to the near genocide of both sides. While she never gets called on her actions, she is clearly horrified by what has happened and does her best to make it up to her friend.
  • Thomas only shot Kocoum to save John and when John willingly takes the blame, it leads to the Indians capturing John and planning to execute him the next morning. When Thomas informs the settlers that they've taken John prisoner, Ratcliffe decides to rally the settlers to attack the natives in an all out war, not simply a rescue mission. Thomas can only stare at his gun in horror while the others eagerly armor up.
• In The Powerpuff Girls Movie, the children who ask the girls to play tag with them on the first day. This leads to the girls getting carried away with their powers and causing massive amounts of destruction to the city. Thus Professor Utonium is held responsible and thrown in jail, allowing Mojo Jojo to convince the girls to side with him and nearly enslave the city.
• Suzume: The titular character opens a Portal Door, triggering an earthquake which damages her hometown, and accidentally frees a living Cosmic Keystone. This triggers a series of disasters across Japan that she and Souta have to stop while trying to retrieve the keystone.
• Andy's Mom in the first three Toy Story movies:
  • In the first, her insistence that Andy can only bring one toy with him to Pizza Planet ends up causing Woody, knowing Andy will pick Buzz over him, to accidentally knock him out of a window, leading to both of them getting lost.
  • In the second, her decision to sell Wheezy at the yard sale leads to Woody going out to the sale to save him, and Woody ends up getting stolen by Al.
  • In the third, she accidentally brings the toys out to be thrown away, even though Andy intended to store them in the attic. The miscommunication causes them all, besides Woody, to donate themselves to Sunnyside.
• Hot Rod was a borderline The Load during the fight between Optimus Prime and Megatron in The Transformers: The Movie. He promptly was hostage by Megatron, resulting in Optimus' death.
• In Turning Red, Mei's mother, Ming, brings Mei's pads to school because she still thinks Mei is having her first period. In fact, Mei is trying to suppress the red panda transformation - and Ming's antics outside her classroom are enough to break her control and push her into transforming.
• Wreck-It Ralph: If Gene hadn't goaded Ralph into getting a medal, many, many problems could have been avoided. On the other hand, no one would have discovered a dark secret about Sugar Rush either.

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