History UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom / WesternAnimation

* ''{{WesternAnimation/Amphibia}}'': The story begins when [[Characters/AmphibiaAnneBoonchuy Anne Boonchuy]], [[Characters/AmphibiaMarcyWu Marcy Wu]], and [[Characters/AmphibiaSashaWaybright Sasha Waybright]] open a mysterious box they found in a thrift shop and it transports them to the titular world.

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Kaeloo}}'': Stumpy is one in the episode "Let's Play the Quest for the Wholly Gruel". [[spoiler: He finds the titular Wholly Gruel, a magic crayon which can make anything it draws real, and uses it to doodle all over some hieroglyphics in a cave depicting characters who resemble him and his friends. He draws a meteorite about to strike them, and his real friends, meanwhile, almost get hit by an actual meteorite.]]

* In the ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDad'' episode, The Hurricane, Klaus becomes this when he encourages Stan to keep trying to defend his family when Stan goes though a HeroicBSoD since it was his poor decision making caused them to be in danger to begin with. This results in Stan resuming to exacerbate the dangerous situation his family is in.

** Mabel became so frightened by the idea of growing up and being separated from her brother that she gave [[CosmicKeystone the rift]] her brother and uncle tried so hard to protect over to Blendin Blandin, who promised he would use it to freeze time for her so she and the rest of Gravity Falls would never change. Instead, Blendin [[NiceJobBreakingItHero revealed himself to be possessed by Bill, who promptly broke it]] [[TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt and began the apocalypse]].

** Lois, who attempts to rectify the Red Bull addiction by disposing of the drink behind his back. Peter then ends up drinking kerosene.
** Joe and Quagmire convince Peter to blow off one dialysis treatment to watch Charles in Charge at the Drunken Clam, which results in Peter's health deteriorating. Since Joe is the most rational of the three, he should have encourage Peter to still go to his dialysis.

* In the ''WesternAnimation/FostersHomeForImaginaryFriends'' special WesternAnimation/DestinationImagination, Herriman {{inter|ruptedCooldownHug}}feres with a resolution between the Face and the rest of the main characters, Frankie included, by scolding him, causing him to go berserk. Unlike most other examples of this trope, he immediately comes to regret this.

*** In ''[[Recap/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagicS2E1TheReturnOfHarmonyPart1 The Return of Harmony, Part 1]]'', the Cutie Mark Crusaders' arguing is what indirectly leads to Discord being released.

* This often happens in ''WesternAnimation/MiraculousLadybug'' where a character picks up the JerkassBall and accidentally drives someone into enough despair to be corrupted by BigBad Hawk Moth. The undisputed queen of this trope is AlphaBitch Chloé Bourgeois, who has a body count in the double digits. Subverted with [[spoiler:Gabriel Agreste, who is Hawk Moth and thus a ''Witting'' Instigator of Doom.]]

* ''WesternAnimation/{{Recess}}'': In the Season 2 episode "Bad Hair Day", TJ bribes Randall with a Señor Fusion Issue #8 comic to say the haircut he give Mikey was good. Randall compliments Mikey's haircut by saying the famous rock band called Dog's Pajamas got the same haircut, causing all the kids on the playground want the same haircut. Then they learn the truth, that this haircut was bad and the members of the band have hair that goes all the way down to their butts, causing all the kids to be angry at Gus, T.J. and Vince. Gus manages to quickly escape, but T.J. and Vince are chased away by an angry mob of their clientele.

** Steven himself unintentionally gets a number of his friends nearly kidnapped to Homeworld by innocently listing off their names when speaking to Peridot way back in Season 1. It turns out that Peridot included their names in her report to Homeworld, which Yellow Diamond used as reference when sending Aquamarine and Topaz to collect humans for Blue Diamond. Steven does [[MustMakeAmends ''not'' take it well]] when he realizes this.

*** "[[Recap/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagicS7E4RockSolidFriendship Rock Solid Friendship]]" reveals that Pinkie's sister Maud Pie inadvertently helped Starlight Glimmer create her cutie mark removal spell by informing her of a stone that could contain the magic.

* ''{{WesternAnimation/Amphibia}}'': The story begins when Anne, Marcy, and Sasha open a mysterious box they found in a thrift shop and it transports them to the titular world.

* ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'': In one episode, [[TerribleTrio The Amoeba Boys]] try to commit a crime and fight the Powerpuff Girls by [[PokeThePoodle standing on the grass next to a sign that says keep off.]] They wait there over night in the rain, which makes them get sick. For the, it's just a common cold, but due to cross contamination, it becomes ThePlague and nearly killed every human in Townsville.

* In many ''{{WesternAnimation/Rugrats}}'' episodes, the plot gets kicked off by the babies misunderstanding something they hear from the adults:

** Squidward in "I Was A Teenage Gary", when he neglects to watch Gary the snail while [=SpongeBob=] is out. [=SpongeBob=] finds Gary and thinks he's ill, calling the veterinarian who recommends a shot of snail plasma. [=SpongeBob=] and the vet (who quickly leaves) have Squidward use the syringe since their afraid of needles, but [=SpongeBob=]'s squeamishness causes Squidward to stick the syringe into [=SpongeBob=] instead of Gary. This leads to [=SpongeBob=] to mutate into a snail, and when he comes to Squidward's house, he causes the latter to freak out so much that he accidentally injects ''himself'' with the syringe.

** When it comes time to contact someone [[spoiler: outside of Final Space to help activate the Hyper-Transdimensional Bridge so the [[Characters/FinalSpaceTheTeamSquad Team Squad]] can escape the titular dimension, Ash decides to reach out to her estranged adoptive father Clarence and relay the instructions and location for doing so. What she doesn't know is that almost everyone in their home galaxy could see the message, including people who have a score to settle with Clarence and/or Gary - people like Todd Watson, who ultimately manages to shoot him dead.]] [[DownplayedTrope Of course]], [[even Clarence had a feeling he wouldn't come back alive; [[RedemptionEqualsDeath he just wanted more than anything to save Ash and prove to his only surviving family member he was capable of doing the right thing for once in his life]], and either way he succeeds at turning on the Bridge on his end with his dying breath and providing the crew a way home, so that checks out.

** When it comes time to contact someone [[spoiler: outside of Final Space to help activate the Hyper-Transdimensional Bridge so the [[Characters/FinalSpaceTheTeamSquad Team Squad]] can escape the titular dimension, Ash decides to reach out to her estranged adoptive father Clarence and relay the instructions and location for doing so. What she doesn't know is that almost everyone in their home galaxy could see the message, including people who have a score to settle with Clarence and/or Gary - people like Todd Watson, who ultimately manages to shoot him dead. [[DownplayedTrope Of course]], even Clarence had a feeling he wouldn't come back alive; [[RedemptionEqualsDeath he just wanted more than anything to save Ash and prove to his only surviving family member he was capable of doing the right thing for once in his life]], and either way he succeeds at turning on the Bridge on his end and providing the crew a way home, so that checks out.
** In "The Leaving", while the bridge (which had [[spoiler:been blown away into the depths of space by the Lord Commander destroying Earth by fusing with the Titan inside) is charging back up, Little Cato asks what his mother was like, to which Avocato (who in actuality had killed the kid's birth parents when he was an infant and never told him) lies to his face and says she passed away from childbirth. Later, after the bridge breaks down from overcharging, Avocato frets to Gary in private about how he lied yet again, then prepares to finally tell his "son" the truth...only to come face-to-face with Ash, who'd walked in on the conversation, including his reminder to Gary about his greatest sin. All this proves to be the last straw for Ash's loyalty to the crew, and thus she deems them all murderous, lying scum and swears fealty to Invictus, while stealing away poor Little Cato to the "good side".]]

** [[spoiler:The real examples would be Marcy's parents and a librarian at school who dropped the book with the box listed in it without even realizing she did it. Marcy grabbed the book, read about the box, and snapped a picture for future reference. She then went home to her parents, who told her they were moving out of state, away from Anne and Sasha. Utterly terrified at the idea of losing them, she ran away crying... and came across the box in the store. Desperate to get away from the real world and its problems, she texted Sasha saying she'd found the ''perfect'' birthday present for Anne. Yes, had Marcy's dad not gotten a new job, or had that librarian not dropped a book, the whole series never would've happened!]]