- In the second half of the pilot episode of Aaahh!!! Real Monsters when Ickis was going to be Snorched for failing to retrieve his lost monster manual, Oblina and Krumm go on an extensive chase to get it back for him. However, as the Gromble pointed out, getting the manual back was Ickis's assignment, so not only do Oblina and Krumm fail to get Ickis out of being Snorched, but they end up joining him.
- An episode of Adventure Time where Finn shares his food with a man who turns out to be a wizard. The wizard turns Finn into a giant foot for his kindness. The moral that this wizard was trying to teach Finn? People are jerks and you shouldn't help them.
- Most of the time, when Disney's Aladdin does a good deed, it turns out okay. However, in "The Citadel", the introductory episode for Knight of Cerebus Evil Sorcerer Mozenrath, when Aladdin tries to save a woman and her baby from a monster, they're actually illusions designed to lure Aladdin in so that Mozenrath can try to talk him into capturing another monster. Aladdin refuses, because Mozenrath is Obviously Evil, but then gets sent to Mozenrath's castle anyway. He finally catches the creature, and then decides to do a good deed for it, letting it back into its own world rather than leaving it as a slave to Mozenrath. Essentially, good deeds were in this case punished with the bitter enmity of the series' most powerful villain.
- In another episode, thanks to Iago getting a bump on the head, he experienced an uncharacteristic amount of selflessness and charitability by giving away a lot of things, including Genie's lamp. Unfortunately, this characteristic ended up causing more harm than good not only to him, but to everyone near him as well.
- American Dad! had an episode, "The Full Cognitive Redaction of Avery Bullock by the Coward Stan Smith," wherein the CIA believes that Avery has dementia and orders Stan to have him mind-wiped, which would make him a vegetable. Stan rebels and saves Avery, only to find his behavior becoming stranger and more nonsensical until he steals a nuclear submarine. Eventually, Stan comes to terms with Avery's dementia and tries to euthanize him with a bullet to the head. However, Stan's bullet hits and destroys a mind-scrambling chip, planted by another CIA agent as retribution for Avery's bullying. Instead of thanking Stan for saving his life and sanity, Avery punishes Stan with a demotion because he didn't follow orders.
- Buttons from Animaniacs embodies this trope. Every episode has Mindy getting out of her harness or crib etc, and causing Buttons to go and save her, going through absolute hell in the process. And at the end of every short the parents scolds him every time. Well, at least Mindy comforts him. He gets praised and rewarded for his dedication and loyalty in The Movie, however.
- Avatar: The Last Airbender:
- In "Zuko Alone", the village Zuko saves from corrupt guards instantly turns on him when it's revealed that he's a firebender. And not just any firebender— Prince Zuko, son of Fire Lord Ozai.
- Thirteen year old Zuko is burned and banished by his father for speaking out against sacrificing newly recruited soldiers.
- In the episode "Imprisoned", Haru saves an old man from a cave-in using his earthbending, only for that man to turn him in to the Fire Nation soldiers occupying their village.
- The Legend of Korra:
- Bolin tries to cheer Korra up after she was rejected by his brother. He spends an entire evening showing her Republic City. What does he get? He gets to see Korra kissing his brother.
- To stay on the side of good and join Team Avatar, Asami has to attack her father, which costs her the comfortable life she knew. Her father later tries to kill her, she gets arrested after helping stop Equalists break out convicts, and then she loses her boyfriend to a girl she recently became friends with.
- In the Batman: The Animated Series episode "The Mechanic", this trope is part of how Earl Cooper became the Batmobile's mechanic. Years ago, Cooper worked for a car company and noticed a fatal flaw in one of their car designs. The CEO refused to change it, and had some goons sent to silence Cooper, but Batman saved him. Unfortunately, this gave him a reputation as a whistle-blower, and as such Cooper couldn't find another job until Batman hired him for his car.
- Batman always follows through with one rule when dealing with the Joker, sometimes even saving the latter. Come Batman Beyond: Return of the Joker, and the flashback that ensued, Batman most likely will wish he hadn't followed that rule knowing that Batman was in a way responsible for the Joker's most horrific (as well as final) act.
- Comes up repeatedly in Big City Greens:
- Specifically Cricket wanting to get out and see the city sights in the first episode is what eventually causes the family truck to be towed.
- In "Present Tense", Cricket is determined to get Remy the ultimate birthday gift by winning a handful of tickets; however, he constantly keeps ditching Remy to do so, and all he wanted was to spend time with a best friend. And when he finally does get the gift, he slips up and ruins Remy's cake, making his birthday even more worse than ever.
- A Half-Arc Season for Season 2 hits this hard for the Green family; Chip Whistler pulls a Fake Defector on them and makes them believe he changed his ways so he can take over for his retiring father as CEO of Wholesome Foods. By believing his trick and signing that forgiveness contract (especially Cricket), not only does this worsen the rivalry even further, but this also leads to Cricket and Gloria losing their jobs at Big Coffee, Chip destroying the café and apartment complex to make room for a megastore expansion, and worst yet, the Greens almost lost their beloved farmhouse — and their legacy. Ouch.
- In "Fast Foodie", Cricket makes a wager with Bill that he and Tilly can eat at the next-door Burger Clown every day for every meal, breakfast, lunch and dinner. Cue the kids eating so much fast food that Cricket ends up bloated while Tilly is ill.
- In Blue Eye Samurai, Mizu spares a boy who saw her leaving the scene of a murder that she had arranged to look like the work of a crime lord's own goon to avoid reprisals on the person who sent her to do it. He tells the crime lord anyway, which leads to Mizu having to fight all of his Mooks to save herself and the person she was trying to help.
- Discussed in the Bob's Burgers episode Thelma and Louise Except Thelma Is Linda. Louise gets detention for pantsing a student, even though she only did it because said student was bullying another. She sees herself being punished as this trope, and the plot focuses on Linda busting her out of detention and trying to reward her to challenge this trope.
- Lazlo quotes this word for word in the Camp Lazlo episode "Irreconcilable Dungferences" after he helps the Dung Beetles with their argument, resulting in him accidentally getting whacked by their fishing poles when they were about to go fishing again.
- Captain Planet and the Planeteers: In "Two Futures", Wheeler is already experiencing burnout when a cave-in during a mission traps him with Dr. Blight and the time portal she came to use. MAL's observation that they're running out of oxygen tips Wheeler over the edge into frustration with his status as a Planeteer. He's fought hard for the environment, and it got him into this cave-in. Captain Planet can't dig them out because of the pollution, and the other Planeteers may or may not manage to get through before they use up all the air. This leads to a temporary Refusal of the Call, followed by an It's a Wonderful Life pastiche.
- Humphrey the Bear’s appearance in Chip 'n Dale: Rescue Rangers involves him saving a curious toddler and looking after him. Unfortunately, the toddler’s parents don’t take kindly to poor Humphrey, who gets shot at and ends up tied to a tree.
- Eek! The Cat's catchphrase was "It never hurts to help!" It always did, though he often didn't notice.
- The Fairly OddParents!:
- Timmy Turner seems to run into this trope a lot. It's most noticeable on the Christmas specials. He is usually in universe and by fans called out on his selfishness and unwillingness to share. However, in the movie A Fairly Odd Christmas as well as Merry Wishmas, Timmy is condemned for being generous because he's "muscling in" on Santa Claus' territory.
- In "Dream Goat!", Timmy helping Chompy leaves him a guilt-ridden, sleep-deprived mess that ultimately gets grounded.
- This trope comes into effect in Fillmore!, near the end of "Two Wheels, Full Throttle, No Brakes". Fillmore was able to catch the culprit behind the scooter thefts. And his reward? He and Ingrid get slammed with desk duty until further notice. Why? Because Fillmore used Vallejo's bike to catch him, but it got smashed in the process. Fillmore explains that his bike was sacrificed for the greater good, but Vallejo's not having any of it.
- Final Space:
- In Season 2, Time Swap Sammy risks his job by helping the Team Squad out with them going back in time to save Avocato and bending the rules of altering time, with more at stake than he had to gain. Season 3 reveals that despite Time Swap Sammy's efforts to cover his tracks and make sure it all worked out for everyone, he still got fired for this and now he's "Spare Some Change" Sammy.
- The zombified alternate Gary's in Final Space are a much more serious example. All of them are Alternate Selves of Gary from hundreds of timelines where Gary sacrificed himself closing the Final Space breach — as if dying as per Heroic Sacrifice standard wasn't bad enough, it's revealed that their mangled corpses got possessed by Invictus, with their souls still trapped inside the undead husks and aware.
- Hazbin Hotel: It’s revealed that Vaggie, Charlie’s girlfriend, used to be one of the best and ruthless Exorcist under Adam’s command, who brutally slaughtered thousands of Sinners. But during one of the annual extermination (which is stated to be happened 3 years before the events of the pilot), she couldn’t bring herself to kill a demon child, and let them go. Alas, she was caught in the act by Lute, who proceeded to gouge her left eye out and rip her wings off, before leaving her to die in Hell as a Fallen Angel. On the bright side, though, she was found and saved by Charlie shortly after, causing Vaggie to fall in love for her.
- In the Home Movies episode "Writer's Block", Melissa innocently offers Coach McGuirk advice to help with his insomnia. He’s... not very grateful.
Melissa: Did you try just laying on your bed and, you know, closing your eyes and relaxing?
Coach McGuirk: Well, that’s genius, Melissa. You’re saying that all I have to do to fall asleep, is go to sleep. Is that what you’re saying, Melissa? (Melissa nods) Good, ‘cause it’s brilliant. You should write a book! You should hold seminars! You’ll make millions of dollars! ATTENTION ALL INSOMNIACS! ALL YA HAVE TO DO TO FALL ASLEEP, IS LAY IN YA BED!
Melissa: (on the verge of tears) ...I’m just trying to help.
Coach McGuirk: LIKE EVERY OTHER WOMAN IN MY LIFE!
Coach McGuirk: Well, that’s genius, Melissa. You’re saying that all I have to do to fall asleep, is go to sleep. Is that what you’re saying, Melissa? (Melissa nods) Good, ‘cause it’s brilliant. You should write a book! You should hold seminars! You’ll make millions of dollars! ATTENTION ALL INSOMNIACS! ALL YA HAVE TO DO TO FALL ASLEEP, IS LAY IN YA BED!
Melissa: (on the verge of tears) ...I’m just trying to help.
Coach McGuirk: LIKE EVERY OTHER WOMAN IN MY LIFE!
- Dib from Invader Zim suffers this constantly. Perhaps most obvious in "Room With a Moose," where the kids mock, wedgy and ostracize him as he tries to warn them about Zim, and then has to use their cruel treatment of him to save their lives. He even considered dooming them despite knowing he'd doom himself as well.
- The Legend of Vox Machina: During the Chroma Conclave's attack on Emon, Allura creates a force field that protects herself and those standing near her from Raishan's poison breath. Sovereign Uriel, who stopped running to help a fallen guard get back onto his feet, does not reach the force field in time and dies in seconds.
- It's pretty common for people to find the titular Kevin Spencer and choose to look past his violence and theft and try to help him get on the right track. Because of the nature of this show, Kevin abuses their kindness and mistreats and steals from them. One episode had him build a friendship with the Widow Coulson, and even though he grew to care for her, he stole her medication.
- In the Looney Tunes short "This Is a Life?", during the parody of 1952's This is Your Life, when Daffy vociferously rants about how it was unfair for Bugs to be presented on stage by Elmer Fudd instead of him, he spots Granny, who was sitting adjacent to him, searching for something. Knowing exactly what she was looking for, Daffy politely hands the old woman her umbrella, and Granny thanks him...by hitting him over the head with it to keep him quiet.
- Loopy de Loop is "ze good wolf" and is always trying to help others, unfortunately everybody makes assumptions about the trustworthiness of his species and abuses him for it.
- Molly of Denali: In "Wise Raven and Old Crow," while tying the boat's rope to a tree, Molly helps out a frog. However, this causes her to not tie the rope securely and for the boat to drift away.
- My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
- Done infamously in the episode Princess Spike. While it's true he does do some selfish and thoughtless things when being put in Twilight Sparkle's leadership position, and thus deserves some of the flak, literally none of these things cause any problems. It's all the things he did with legitimately good intentions while trying to actually do things Twilight Sparkle would do and an overabundance of Dragon Sneeze Plants (guess what they do) that cause all the problems, meaning if he hadn't done anything wrong he still would have been dragged through the wringer. The resulting Broken Aesop didn't sit well with many fans and is a major reason it appears so frequently on "Worst Episode lists
". - "Marks for Effort" also offers this. Namely, it revolves around the CMC helping a student named Cozy Glow with studying for an exam, doing their absolute best to teach her everything about friendship and succeeding in having her remember it all. The end result? Cozy Glow not only fails the exam hard, Twilight Sparkle also accuses the CMC of teaching her the wrong things and promptly forbids them from coming to the school and communicating with its students. As it turns out later on, Cozy Glow failed the exam because she intentionally wrote all the wrong answers in hopes of making the CMC seem like they still have things about friendship to learn. Becomes even worse when Cozy reveals her true motives for entering the school in the S8 finale.
- Done infamously in the episode Princess Spike. While it's true he does do some selfish and thoughtless things when being put in Twilight Sparkle's leadership position, and thus deserves some of the flak, literally none of these things cause any problems. It's all the things he did with legitimately good intentions while trying to actually do things Twilight Sparkle would do and an overabundance of Dragon Sneeze Plants (guess what they do) that cause all the problems, meaning if he hadn't done anything wrong he still would have been dragged through the wringer. The resulting Broken Aesop didn't sit well with many fans and is a major reason it appears so frequently on "Worst Episode lists
- In the Popeye cartoon "A Dream Walking", Popeye saves Olive from sleepwalking at a construction site and brings her back to her bedroom. However, when she wakes up, she thinks Popeye is being The Peeping Tom and throws stuff at him.
- In "Little Swee'pea", Popeye saves Swee'pea from the zoo animals and bring him home safely. Popeye decides to entertain him with a toy monkey, which scares him, causing Olive to think he's scaring Swee'Pea and promptly cleans Popeye's clock. Popeye ends the cartoon saying:
"There's no ifs or maybes, I'll never have babies/I'm Popeye the Sailor Man!" (toot-toot) - Morty of Rick and Morty is The Anti-Nihilist who frequently tries to do the right thing, much to the chagrin of Genre Savvy Straw Nihilist Rick who warns him he'll only suffer for it and is proven right every time.
- In the episode "Mortynight Run" Morty takes offense to Rick's arms dealing and foils an assassination, saving a Starfish Alien and causing many more deaths in the process. Turns out that said alien was plotting a Final Solution with the rest of its kind, and Morty's forced to put him down himself ensuring that everything he did was for nothing.
- In "Look Who's Purging Now", Morty gets himself and Rick stranded on a planet of Beast Men reenacting The Purge after demanding they stop to rescue a girl around his age.
- In "A Rick in King Mortur's Mort", the simple act of returning some dropped food leads to him held hostage by Stern Sun Worshippers.
- The previous episode "Analyze Piss" sees Rick fall victim to this after he Took a Level in Kindness through therapy. He does a Dead Person Impersonation to save the reputation of a man accidentally Driven to Suicide by Jerry, and just when it seems like everything's going to be fine he confides the truth to Morty who then tells the rest of the family out of spite. They then all blame Rick for not simply taking it to his grave.
- Morty does it again a season later in "That's Amorte" when he finds out the spaghetti Rick's been giving the family came from dead Human Aliens. This time, the family takes issue with him for going out of his way to ruin spaghetti night and Beth tries to praise him for doing the right thing but her heart obviously isn't in it. To make matters worse, he also told on himself to the aliens who then start forcing each other to commit suicide en masse to produce the spaghetti.Morty: Yes, I want you to fix it. None of this would have happened if you'd been honest about the spaghetti.
Rick: Morty, I lied to protect you. You told the truth to hurt me. I can't travel the galaxy with you if every time we come near a fucked-up system, you leap into its wires and electrocute yourself.
- The Simpsons:
- Homer's mom became a runaway outlaw once she helped Mr. Burns after a bunch of hippies walked all over him. Even the producers lampshaded this in the commentary by saying that "Never act in kindness" was the moral.
- However, in that same episode, Chief Wiggum was very grateful for how Mona helped him and helped to smuggle her out of town.
- In "Homer's Enemy", Frank Grimes saves Homer from drinking a vial of acid, but smashes it against a wall. Burns chews out Grimes for wasting his precious acid and damaging the wall (Though who keeps acid in the dining area?), and even worse, had Frank not saved Homer, Homer might have died.
- Homer, upset that he had made an enemy, did try to make it up to Grimes by inviting him over for dinner. He was instead castigated by Grimes about having been an incompetent bum yet achieving more in his life than harder working people like himself have.
- Also, in "Home Away From Homer", Ned Flanders attempted to be kind by allowing two female college students to stay while they sleep and work on their studies. How do they repay him? By using the room he rented out to them as a studio for a softcore video site, sexy slumber party. Similarly in the same episode, Flanders attempts to be a good neighbor to his town and to Homer, but his attempts at good deeds are repaid by Homer leaking the video to the whole town, as well as the town cheering on the girls when Ned evicts them, and mocking him behind their backs.
- And speaking of Ned Flanders, in "Hurricane Neddy", there's his "The Reason You Suck" Speech to all of Springfield... except this was after the townspeople had selflessly tried to help rebuild his house. It ended in failure, but they did try, which is lampshaded and derided in the speech itself by Ned.
- In "Marge Gamer", Bart, as the Shadow Knight, decides to do a good deed and sacrifice two-thirds of his life to resurrect an elf, Marge, although Marge tends to Bart, the same can't be said for the rest of the characters, deciding that his action meant he was easy pickings, and decided to take advantage of his weakened state by brutally slaughtering him. While Bart lost interest on the game anyway, Marge decided to avenge him.
- In "HOMR", when Homer became smart, he sent a safety report to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. This led to all the SNPP workers losing their jobs.
- In "Bart's Girlfriend", Bart becomes attracted to Reverend Lovejoy's daughter Jessica, but discovers that she's even more mischievous than he is, after he witnessed her steal the money out of the church collection plate. After he refused to go along with it, she leaves right when the members of the church noticed Bart with the empty collection plate. If not for Lisa's determination to defend her brother, Bart would have been run out of Springfield.
- During the "Treehouse Of Horror XI" segment "Day Of The Dolphin", Lisa helped a dolphin to escape back to sea. Said dolphin eventually lead other dolphins in taking the surface away from mankind. (They claim they used to live at the surface before being ran out of it by humans) Also, when Lisa noticed a dolphin with a nose stuck at a can ring, she helped it and it bit her hand hard. Lisa almost snaps and curses at him before Homer sucker punches it.
- In "The Old Man and the Lisa", Lisa decides to help Mr. Burns after he goes broke on the advice of yes men. Lisa encourages him to become an honest business man and help people by starting a recycling company. But Burns' morality is so twisted, he gets the idea to help people by recycling sea animals into a slurry, to Lisa's utter horror.
Homer: Well Lisa, you've learned your lesson. Never help anyone.- In "Poppa's Got A Brand New Badge", after the Springfield Police Department fails to stop rioters during a city-wide blackout, Homer creates a private security company called SpringShield, which soon makes him an enemy to Fat Tony and his gang. The only time Homer takes his work seriously, and isn't corrupted or incompetent, is the time he is about to get killed for it. He even lampshades this.
- Homer's mom became a runaway outlaw once she helped Mr. Burns after a bunch of hippies walked all over him. Even the producers lampshaded this in the commentary by saying that "Never act in kindness" was the moral.
- A very tragic examples happens in Skunk Fu! in regards to the Big Bad Dragon. Before the events of the show, Dragon protected the valley from danger. To test his loyalty, the Heavens caused a drought and when Dragon asks the Heavens if he can use his ability to manipulate water to end the drought, the Heavens remained silent and since they technically did not say 'No' to Dragon, he used his powers to end the drought. However, the Heavens stripped him of his ability to fly since they saw him ending their drought as an act of 'arrogance'. It should be noted that regardless of arrogance, he still used his powers for the sake of others. It's no wonder he's so bitter in the present.
- South Park:
- Kyle Broflovski tries to get Heidi Turner out of an emotionally abusive relationship with Eric Cartman. When Cartman learns of this he uses Kyle's interference to manipulate Heidi into rejecting Kyle and become Cartman's Distaff Counterpart. It gets Subverted when Kyle makes Heidi realize what she has become after she rejected Kyle help and letting Cartman's influence change her, causing Heidi to end the abusive relationship herself for good.
- Cartman himself suffers this in South Park: Post Covid: The Return of Covid, where after initially against Stan and Kyle from fixing the Bad Future, he is convinced by his wife Yentl to help change the past so that everyone else can have a better future. The result of Cartman's selfless act is that he looses his loving family and is reduced to being a Crazy Homeless Person whose Forced to Watch everyone else get a happy ending in the "good" future.
- SpongeBob SquarePants:
- The episode "Can You Spare a Dime?" features Squidward quitting his job over a misunderstanding. When he ends up losing his house, SpongeBob selflessly takes him into his own home, and takes care of him. Whille initially thankful of SpongeBob for helping him in time of need, Squidward eventually becomes a freeloader, forcing SpongeBob to wait on him hand and foot (and wear a French Maid outfit), and throwing violent tantrums when he does not comply to Squidward's whims to every detail.
- In "Porous Pockets", SpongeBob gets his hands on a fortune and generously buys ice cream for a stranger. Cue an enormous crowd of moochers skulking for free money until SpongeBob is bone dry.
- A similar thing happens in "The Sponge Who Could Fly" where SpongeBob uses his flying pants to perform heroic deeds but the citizens of Bikini Bottom quickly become demanding him for more or less everything so when he tries to escape they hunt him down because he "owes" them favors. These being the same citizens who ridiculed him for wanting to fly and formed an angry mob against him for having dreams earlier in the episode.
- Star Trek: Lower Decks: In "No Small Parts", when the Pakleds board the Cerritos, Mariner reveals her numerous stashes of contraband weapons with which the crew can arm themselves. This is instrumental in allowing the crew to fight off the boarders — and, once the crisis is resolved, it also lands her with a stay in the brig for hiding that much contraband on the ship.
- Steven Universe: In "Bubbled", Steven is floating stranded in space with a ruby he's nicknamed Eyeball. After an asteroid fractures her Gem Heart, Steven uses his healing powers to restore her; this leaves Eyeball attributing this power to his war traitor mother Rose Quartz, and relentlessly attempts to stab him with a chisel.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003): Discussed in the opening narration of "City at War, Part 2". According to Mikey, the Turtles thought they did the city a favor when they defeated the Shredder at the end of "Secret Origins, Part 3". However, the resulting Evil Power Vacuum has created a gang war between the Purple Dragons, Foot remnants, and mobsters that threatens to destroy New York. Leo tries to fix things, but his actions in fact trigger a huge battle that wrecks a city block.
- Thomas & Friends: In "Thomas Toots the Crows", Thomas volunteers to watch over Farmer McColl's fields while his scarecrow is being repaired, whistling to chase off any crows that might show up to eat his seeds. When he tries to scare off two in particular, he winds up leaving the farm and chasing them all over the island; once they have left for good, he returns to the farm where he is chastised for leaving his post, and in the time he was gone, the fields are now flooded with crows.
- In the Tom and Jerry cartoon "Buddies Thicker than Water", Tom is out in the snow and begs Jerry to help him. Jerry lets Tom into the penthouse apartment he lives in, warms Tom up, and gives him a hot meal. When the owner returns home and attempts to throw Tom out, he ingratiates himself to her by grabbing Jerry and throwing him out in the snow. Of course, this gives Jerry the justification he needs to scare Tom out of the house again and then ignore a second plea for help at the end of the cartoon.
- Granted, this was also recycled with the roles reversed in "Snowbody Loves Me". After a frozen Jerry knocks on Tom's door, Tom opens it, after which Jerry sneaks in and locks Tom out in the cold. Similarly an indignant Tom manages to get back in and kick Jerry out, though suffers a Jerkass Realization and lets him back in, this time with more upbeat results.
- Total Drama: With a million on the line, kindness isn't always rewarded.
- In "The Sand Witch Project", Lindsay makes a grab at being more of a leader and less of a follower after some insults from Heather. She proves good at it, making level-headed decisions and calming her team when it's needed until DJ pulls off a trick she falls for too. Despite her resourcefulness, Lindsay is on the chopping block that night because her team got frightened that the kindhearted airhead put her foot down.
- After the bus crash in "Celebrity Manhunt's TDA Reunion Show", Geoff, Justin, Beth, Trent, Katie, Sadie, Eva, and DJ's Momma go out on foot to look for help for the rest of the campers, even risking their lives when they accidentally stumble into an active Doom Town. What is the reward for their attempt to save their friends? That they don't get nominated for World Tour, while the people who preferred to sleep, sunbathe, eat, and overall do nothing to improve their predicament all do get to be in World Tour.
- In "A Mine Is a Terrible Thing to Waste", the Toxic Rats can make a clean escape from the mine with the statue they retrieved, but half of the Mutant Maggots are in immediate danger of simultaneously dying from radiation exposure, getting mauled, and being blown up. Brick can't leave them behind and uses the statue to club down the mutant gopher blocking their way. The statue breaks in two and while Brick's heroism gets everyone out of the mine, it also costs the Toxic Rats their victory. They vote Brick off that evening.
- In "The Obsta-Kill Course", Alejandro repeatedly loosens his efforts to win the challenge and get through it safely in order to try to warn the other contestants about Mal, but no one wants to listen to him. Meanwhile, Mal's deceit ensures enough votes against Alejandro to get him eliminated that evening.
- Dave gets captured by a bear in "Mo' Monkey, Mo' Problems" and there's little that can be done to save him. Ella goes against Chris's ban on singing to get the bear to let go of Dave and follow the team back to Chris, as they need something the bear ate to win. And the Wâneyihtam Maskwak do win, meaning Ella would've been safe if Sugar hadn't been waiting for this opportunity. She lets Chris anonymously know that Ella went against his orders, which gets her eliminated.
- Total Drama Presents: The Ridonculous Race.
- Subverted with the ridiculously-nice Surfer Dudes who allow the Best Friends to reach the Chill Zone first during the Vietnam challenge, meaning that they come in last and get eliminated. However, a few episodes later the Best Friends have to quit due to Devin's injury; when asked to pick a losing team to replace them in the race, they naturally choose to repay the Surfer Dudes. The Surfer Dudes wind up winning the race in one of the two canon endings.
- Played Straight with The Goths who help out the Ice Dancers by letting them know that the trophy-shaped lava rock Josee took from Hawaii was actually a very potent bad luck charm and how to properly dispose of it to break the curse. The Ice Dancer repay this kindness several episodes later, by kidnapping Loki, Ennui's pet rabbit, making the Goths fall too far behind as they searched for the bunny, causing them to be eliminated.
- Wander over Yonder:
- In "The Good Deed", Wander finds his every attempt to do good leads to bigger troubles, to the point it drives Lord Hater to try and blow up the sun. He starts to literally sinks into despair until Sylvia gives him a pep-talk. When they stop the plan, Karmic Jackpot is reached.
- In "The Nice Guy", Wander's kindness again backfires when his desire to be nice and helpful complicates a simple attempt to buy Sylvia a bottle of her favorite soda. He even ends up giving the last bottle of Thunder Blazz to a little girl... who ends up giving it to Sylvia herself, since she was inspired by Wander.
- X-Men: Evolution has the end of Season 2: The Sentinel is released, and by sticking around to fight it, the mutants are forced to reveal themselves, causing mass witch hunting and prejudice against them, even after they prove that they weren't responsible for the Sentinel and were the good guys there. Then, as the end of the series proves, the same thing happens when they defeat Apocalypse, and it's revealed that mutant hatred will continue, more, and more powerful, sentinels will be built and used, one of their closest allies will be consumed by darkness, and at least two of them will be noticeably missing in the future line up. Hey, at least Magneto will become good and the Brotherhood will join SHIELD, but since it was SHIELD who were placed in charge of Sentinel production in the present, that might not be a good thing.
- The Gabby cartoons spun off from Gulliver's Travels are built on this. Whether trying to change the diaper of a fussy baby, help the Lilliput fire department or clean King Little's castle? Gabby will always find a way to screw it up royally. These attempts usually end with him getting a beating.
