History CaptainObviousReveal / WesternAnimation

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons'': Played for laughs in the Treehouse of Horror segment "Hell Toupee". Lisa [[InternalReveal realizes what's happening]] during the climax and starts to InfoDump, only for Marge to interrupt and chide her that [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall "Everyone's already figured that out."]]

-->'''Fry''': You mean Bender is the evil Bender? I am shocked, shocked! ...Well, not that shocked.

* ''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'': In the "Shadow of the Bat" two-parter that introduces Batgirl, the mastermind behind the plot to frame Commissioner Gordon for corruption remains hidden in the shadows until near the end of Part 1, when he's revealed to be Two-Face. Except that between his hideout possessing the half-pristine, half-rundown nature you'd expect from a Two-Face lair and the show not bothering to hide Creator/RichardMoll's distinctive {{Guttural Growl|er}}, it's pretty obvious it's him from the get-go.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/StarVsTheForcesOfEvil'' episode, "The Hard Way", it's revealed that [[BigBad Toffee]] (thought to be dead following the season one finale) lives on inside a fragment of Star's wand. Many had predicted that he became a part of the wand as early as the ending to season one, owing to his smirk at the wand's destruction even when he was about to be blown up, as well as his demonstrated HealingFactor. Season 2 only made it more obvious, with Star's wand established to be corrupted, his missing finger being inside the wand, his skeletal arm clutching the wand fragment (which wasn't seen at the end of season one) forming Ludo's wand, ''which talks to him'', and the build-up of Toffee as a character with importance to Star's family and the universe at large.

* PlayedForLaughs in ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'', when "Roy Rogers [=McFreely=]" reveals himself to be Roger in disguise. He apparently thought that Stan would be surprised by this.

* The ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' episode ''Rarity Investigates'' has the "twist" that Wind Rider is the bad guy...and it's about as obvious as an F5 tornado. Show staff [[https://trixiebooru.org/983103 admitted as such]], but pointed out that the episode was less about actually fooling the audience and more about [[RuleOfCool doing a cool Film Noir parody]].

* ''WesternAnimation/SkullIsland2023'': Were you even remotely surprised when [[LukeIAmYourFather Irene revealed that she's been pursuing and capturing Annie because she's Annie's long-lost mother]]? They both have similar complexions and a FamilyEyeResemblance, Annie is a WildChild whose father is seen in flashback but not her mother, Irene makes a point of wanting Annie captured with as little harm done to her as possible, Ireneacts very mother-like towards Annie when the latter's unconscious. You probably qworked it out a whole episode before Cap had his interrupted EurekaMoment.

** Hunter being an ArtificialHuman created by Belos [[ReplacementGoldfish in the image of his dead brother]] was pretty widely assumed ''long'' before it was officially confirmed. He looks near-identical to a statue that was widely assumed to be said brother, he has no magical abilities (which adds up if he's human rather than a part of a WitchSpecies), and Belos is repeatedly shown alongside notes and experiments that suggest he's working or has worked to create a human. That said, this is a case where the actual reveal ends up being in the details. Most assumed that Belos's brother died through some tragic circumstance and Hunter is the first attempt to recreate him--as it turns out, [[CainAndAbel Belos killed his brother]], [[ExpendableClone Hunter is just the most recent attempt of many]], and Belos has killed the others as well for rebelling against him.

** The mastermind of the ''ComicBook/CivilWar'' arc in Season 3 being ComicBook/{{Ultron}}, as both the season was subtitled "Ultron Revolutions" and Season 2 had its own adaptation of ''[[ComicBook/CivilWar Civil War]]'' that ended with Ultron being the main villain.

** This is PlayedForLaughs in the episode "The Sting". When Fry is killed, anyone who's not completely {{Genre Blind|ness}} knew [[ContractualImmortality they were going to]] [[BackFromTheDead bring him back to life]]. The writers knew this from the beginning, so they kept on having Fry come back to life, but it was one of Leela's delusions. In the end, it was played straight.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Gargoyles}}'': a new gargoyle character, Angela, is eventually added into the cast, explicitly born from an egg belonging to Goliath's clan in medieval Scotland which survived the massacre at the beginning of the series. Elisa points out that she resembles Demona, but also clearly has some of Goliath's features, namely his skin tone and his hair. Unsurprisingly, she turns out to be Goliath and Demona's biological daughter.

** Hunter being an ArtificialHuman created by Belos [[ReplacementGoldfish in the image of his dead brother]] was pretty widely assumed ''long'' before it officially came out. He looks near-identical to a statue that was widely assumed to be said brother, he's given a weird amount of autonomy by a fairly no-nonsense EvilOverlord, he has no magical abilities (which adds up if he's human rather than a part of a WitchSpecies), and Belos is repeatedly shown alongside notes and experiments that suggest he's working or has worked to create a human. That said, this is a case where the actual reveal ends up being in the details. Many assumed that Belos's brother died through some tragic circumstance and Hunter is the first attempt to recreate him--as it turns out, [[CainAndAbel Belos killed his brother]], [[ExpendableClone Hunter is just the most recent attempt of many]], and Belos has killed the others as well for rebelling against him.

* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons": Played for laughs in the Treehouse of Horror segment "Hell Toupee". Lisa [[InternalReveal realizes what's happening]] during the climax and starts to InfoDump, only for Marge to interrupt and chide her that [[LeaningOnTheFourthWall "Everyone's already figured that out."]]

** Hunter is actually an ArtificialHuman created by Belos [[ReplacementGoldfish in the image of his dead brother]] was pretty widely assumed ''long'' before it officially came out. He looks near-identical to a statue that was widely assumed to be said brother, he's given a weird amount of autonomy by a fairly no-nonsense EvilOverlord, he has no magical abilities (which adds up if he's human rather than a part of a WitchSpecies), and Belos is repeatedly shown alongside notes and experiments that suggest he's working or has worked to create a human. That said, this is a case where the actual reveal ends up being in the details. Many assumed that Belos's brother died through some tragic circumstance and Hunter is the first attempt to recreate him--as it turns out, [[CainAndAbel Belos killed his brother]], [[ExpendableClone Hunter is just the most recent attempt of many]], and Belos has killed the others as well for rebelling against him.

** As an extension of this, Belos and Philip being the same person became a popular theory as soon as it was revealed that Luz wasn't the first human to wander into the Demon Realm.

* ''WesternAnimation/GravityFalls'': Grunkle Stan has a twin brother. Given that the show deliberately includes all sorts of details and clues for fans to analyze, it didn't take them long to piece it together. Creator/AlexHirsch even commented that he modified the way TheReveal was handled because the theory was so popular (specifically, the fact that Stan has a twin isn't the reveal, it's the fact that said twin is the guy who wrote the journals that Dipper has been following for the whole series). A few episodes later, a massive LampshadeHanging occurs, with the characters watching an episode of [[ShowWithinAShow Ducktective]] and being less than impressed with the reveal that Ducktective has a twin brother because they found it so obvious.

* ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'': The BigBad Hawk Moth turned out to be Adrien Agreste/Cat Noir's father Gabriel. Both Gabriel and Hawk Moth have similar facial structures and builds, they have the same voice actor in most languages (and Creator/KeithSilverstein doesn't even bother to make his voice sound different outside of [[EvilSoundsDeep making Hawk Moth deeper]]), Hawk Moth's [[TransformationTrinket Miraculous]] has a picture of Gabriel's wife in it, and Gabriel was shown to have a book about the Miraculouses as well as the Peacock Miraculous inside of a secret safe. Prior to TheReveal, the fandom was basically split between "it's obviously Gabriel" and "it's ''too'' obviously Gabriel so it must be a RedHerring."
* The ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' episode ''Rarity Investigates'' has the "twist" that Wind Rider is the bad guy...and it's about as obvious as an F5 tornado. Show staff [[https://trixiebooru.org/983103 admitted as such]], but pointed out that the episode was less about actually fooling the audience and more about [[RuleOfCool doing a cool Film Noir]].
* The reveal in ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'' that Hunter was actually an ArtificialHuman created by Belos [[ReplacementGoldfish in the image of his dead brother]] was pretty widely assumed ''long'' before it officially came out. He looks near-identical to a statue that was widely assumed to be said brother, he's given a weird amount of autonomy by a fairly no-nonsense EvilOverlord, he has no magical abilities (which adds up if he's human rather than a part of a WitchSpecies), and Belos is repeatedly shown alongside notes and experiments that suggest he's working or has worked to create a human. That said, this is a case where the actual reveal ends up being in the details. Many assumed that Belos's brother died through some tragic circumstance and Hunter is the first attempt to recreate him--as it turns out, [[CainAndAbel Belos killed his brother]], [[ExpendableClone Hunter is just the most recent attempt of many]], and Belos has killed the others as well for rebelling against him.
** Also Belos and Philip being the same person