Heroic BSOD/Western Animation

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


What happens when an animated hero stops being so animated.

  • Hoodwinked:
    • Red Riding Hood: Takes off her hood and questions her purpose as a goody-maker after finding out that her Grandma has been lying and living a double-life.
  • In WITCH, Hay Lin suffers a Heroic BSOD after believing that her grandmother Yan Lin has started serving Nerissa, and that her boyfriend has betrayed her as well. Hay Lin becomes depressed and nearly catatonic, culminating in a Transformation Sequence where her teammates call out their own elements happily, and Hay Lin just stands there, her head bowed. She gets out of it when she learns that the Yan Lin they've been fighting is actually a clone.
  • In an episode of The Fairly OddParents, Timmy tells the Crimson Chin that he's only a comic book character, resulting in CC going into a Heroic BSOD where he is curled up in a ball crying for most of the episode feeling unimportant. He snaps back to normal when Timmy has a brush with death at the hands of his nemesis.
  • Fitz from Twelve Ounce Mouse goes through a BSOD after his best friend Skillet is killed. He completely gives up on everything, and wanders off to play a game of Pinball.
  • Mr. Krabs, in the SpongeBob SquarePants episode "One Krab's Trash," has a Heroic BSOD when he hears how much his drinking cap is worth.
    • And in SB-129, Squidward learns he really is in the future. (Here's a Flanderized version)
      • A more soul-crushing example happens to SpongeBob himself on "The Krabby Khronicle". Mr. Krabs starts a newspaper, and has SpongeBob on the clock 24 hours writing controversial and untrue stories. At first SpongeBob sees it as a joke, but his stories start damaging his friends' reputations and ruining their lives, as well as straining his friendships. Mr. Krabs them begins blackmailing him to keep it up. SpongeBob is sleep-deprived and powerless to argue, and has a disturbingly quiet breakdown. Until he starts writing about Mr. Krabs.
  • Happens to Leela from Futurama, when Fry jumps in front of her to save her from being impaled on the stinger of a giant killer bee, and apparently dies on the spot. Made much worse by the fact that not only did Fry die for her, but Leela ignored all of Fry's pleas to be careful, as well as all warning signs that their current expedition was a festering death trap, simply in order to appear tough. She spirals into a deep, guilt-ridden depression and loses her mind, becoming more and more deranged and confused as she is shoved through a series of nightmares involving Fry. In the end, it thankfully turns out to be just a dream, as the stinger went right through Fry and pierced her, leaving her in a deep coma.
    • Bender somehow finds a way to combine this with Roaring Rampage of Revenge after realizing that his inspector let him exist without a backup unit, dooming him to be both defective and mortal.
    • Fry has one when he finds out that Nibbler blew him into the cryogenic tube in 1999.
      • And also when he goes back in time and unwittingly impregnates his own grandmother, thus becoming his own grandfather.
  • Dante Vale from Huntik has a BSOD when he gives up the amulets of power on the offchance that his enemy will save Metz, his mentor. Zahlia has to protect him for most of an episode as he's literally non responsive.
  • Kyle suffers one of these on South Park after Cartman convinces him to see The Passion of the Christ, claiming that it "proves" the Jews killed Jesus. The Jewish Kyle is horrified at what he sees, to the point where he becomes ashamed of his Jewish heritage, just as Cartman had hoped. The Gentiles Stan and Kenny are less impressed with the movie, with Stan going so far as to declare it a "snuff film."
    • Stan gets a really bad one in "Raisins" after Wendy broke up with him, which made him become one of the Goths. He gets better after Butters gives him and the other Goths a pep talk.
  • Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers: Gadget Hackwrench has one in part 3 of the Five Episode Pilot (which is also her debut episode) after the plane she pilots crashes in Glacier Bay. She laments that she won't be as good as her father Geegaw Hackwrench, but in part 4, she gets better, and saves the other Rangers with the plane she re-modeled into the flying detergent bottle/balloon mecha we recognize throughout the series.
    • Another one occurs in "The Case of the Cola Cult." When another of her inventions malfunctions (in truth because the villain of the episode sabotaged it) and in turn nearly leads to the Rangers getting killed, Gadget becomes so distraught she resigns from the team.
  • Suffered by Leonardo (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 2003) twice. The first time occurs after he is badly beaten and almost killed by the Foot Clan, which leaves him comatose and melancholy afterwards. The second time occurs after the turtles are handily defeated and have to resort to sacrificing themselves just to stop the Big Bad from winning. This necessity is fortunately prevented, but just the idea that the situation got that bad disturbs Leonardo. As the Big Brother, he blames himself for failing his family and goes into a self-destructive spiral, training obsessively, forcing his brothers to do likewise, and being surly and moody in general. It takes 13 episodes of not listening to Splinter, a literal journey, and a Star Wars-esque "yourself behind the Vader mask" moment to get Leonardo to recover his senses.
  • In the episode of Higglytown Heroes 'Kip's Dad Gets a Strike', Kip's Dad has a Heroic BSOD moment when his X-57 bowling ball breaks. And for nearly the entire episode, he sits in his massage chair whimpering over the remains of his shattered bowling ball. Ughh, more like Idiotic BSOD.
  • Toki Wartooth of Metalocalypse has had two in the series so far- In season 1 episode 'Dethfam' he spends almost the whole episode pretty much catatonic due to being around his parents, and in the season 2 episode 'Dethdad' he does it again when he learns his father is dying of cancer and has to go home to Norway to see him.
    • Toki goes catatonic again in season 3's "Dethzazz" (referred to as his "punishment hole," named after the confinement pit his father made him live in when he messed up his daily chores.) Only the presence of Doctor Rockso can revive him.
    • Pickles has one in season three when he's told that he's dying. He's not. The cat is.
  • Avatar: The Last Airbender does this a lot, in particular with Aang. When he goes through BSOD, he goes into the Avatar State. The most memorable is when he finds Gyasto's skeleton, surrounded by Fire Nation soldiers.
  • Korra suffers a big one after being confronted by Amon who defeats her with ease and tells her that when the time is right he will break and destroy her.
  • She isn't really a heroine, but Charlotte of Making Fiends falls into a depression trance after hearing a sad poem about a kitten stuck somewhere high. She gets over it by the end of the episode though.
    • Charlotte also got one when Vendetta named Marion her "new best friend" at Charlotte's expense, but it was a weaker variant of the trope as Charlotte wasn't too depressed and constantly tried to get Vendetta's attention.
  • Nightscream in Beast Machines experiences one upon finding a cave full of fossils and realising that if he wasn't so selfish, he could have saved a lot of Transformers from Megatron.
  • Phineas and Ferb's Phineas has one of these in the Christmas special when Danville got labelled "naughty" by Santa
    • Again in "Summer Belongs To You" when he runs out of ideas when he and the others are stuck on a deserted island.

"Hey, Baljeet, you sure you don't need any robotic suction spikes up there? ... Or how about...mechanical lobster claws? ... Or maybe gas-propelled pinecone grappling hooks? Or cyberneticly-controlled towing spiders?"

    • Candace, while not exactly a hero, suffers one of these at the end of "Picture This." Her repetitive stutter forming the breakbeat for an improvised rap.
    • And "Thaddeus and Thor": "Nice going! You broke their brains."
  • This happens to Hank and Dean Venture upon seeing tanks full of their own clones. Brock even points out that they're in some kind of "saw your own clone" coma.
  • In Mickey, Donald, Goofy: The Three Musketeers, the titular trio goes through a very brief bout after failing to stop Princess Minnie and Daisy from being kidnapped. Mickey goes through a more heart-breaking example when he's convinced he is left for dead.
  • Darkwing Duck goes through this after his initial attempt to stop the Fearsome Five fails in "Just Us Justice Ducks".
  • Dot Matrix of ReBoot has one of these after losing important data to Megabyte. Phong realizes that Dot has lost her confidence, and instigates an It's a Wonderful Plot to help her come to her senses.
  • In the Tale Spin episode "A Bad Reflection on You", Baloo does this after a. realizing the award Shere Khan gave him is meaningless and b. getting captured by Don Karnage and his Air Pirates. However, he recovers when he learns that Kit still has faith in him.
    • Rebecca has a more comical variant in "I Only Have Ice For You", breaking down sobbing after she realises her guidebook to flying is useless and has gotten everyone captured by the Sky Pirates. Played more seriously later on when she admits rather humbly to Baloo that she's a much worse pilot than him and (supposedly) ruined their delivery, even he seems rather touched by this.
  • Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated makes its version of Fred Jones somewhat prone to these. Probably to make up for him being much more skilled with traps and slightly more Genre Savvy than his previous versions.
  • Soren in Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole has this after he kills Metalbeak.
  • DC Showcase: Superman/Shazam!: The Return of Black Adam had Billy Batson suffer one of these after Black Adam offered him a Sadistic Choice between his own life and the life of a hostage. Adam then attempts to kill both Billy and the hostage, and would have succeeded if Superman hadn't interfered. The BSOD only lasted for a few moments though, and after it passed, well, one magic word later it got REALLY ugly for Adam.
  • Blossom had one on The Powerpuff Girls when one of her plans backfired, something Mojo Jojo tried to exploit. Buttercup had one in another episode when she lost her Security Blanket.
    • In the episode "All Chalked Up", Bubbles has one of these when her drawings of monsters come to life. Blossom and Buttercup end up having to start the fight without her.
  • Cody suffers from this in Total Drama World Tour when his ride to Hawaii is destroyed. Sierra snaps him out of it.
  • Numbuh One from Codename: Kids Next Door had one in Operation Z.E.R.O. when he realized that his rashness had sent him straight into a trap set by Father and helped resurrect the ultimate evil Grandfather. It took a peptalk from (of all people) Numbuh 101 to get him moving again.
    • Got one earlier when the Delightful Children turned him into an adult. It takes Numbuh 5 giving him a Rousing Speech to snap him out of it.
  • Homer Simpson goes into a not-so-heroic screaming-coma in the episode "The Blunder Years" after he remembers a horrible secret from his past.
  • 2D of Gorillaz has a couple, most notably when he was drugged and kidnapped by Murdoc. In the "Stylo" music video he can be seen slouching helplessly in the car as they speed toward Plastic Beach, chanting, "overload, overload, overload, comin' up to the overload..."
  • My Little Pony Friendship Is Magic: All the main characters suffer a nervous breakdown or something similar during the first season for reasons fitting each of their personalities, usually to do with their special talents, symbolized by their cutie marks. This has been dubbed Cutie Mark Failure Insanity Syndrome by the fanbase. The second season continues to be almost as cruel, although it only happens to target Twilight Sparkle and Fluttershy with these.
    • Applejack is usually a hard-working, honest pony that gets the job done. In the episode "Applebuck Season", she makes it her task to solely buck all the apples in their whole apple farm, which is way too much for just one pony. Mostly due to tiredness, she ends up botching everything else, insisting she's all right, until at the end of the episode she finally accepts help from others.
    • Twilight Sparkle is highly organised, potentially to the point of neuroticism when things don't go as planned, and secretly afraid of rejection by or failing those she cares about. These include particularly her mentor Princess Celestia and, after the first story, her True Companions the other main characters.
      • In the episode "Swarm of the Century", Twilight unhinges briefly ("We've got to build an exact copy of Ponyville right over there! We've got less than a minute!") when Celestia is coming to visit her hometown just when it is falling apart in a complete state of chaos.
      • Twilight has a much more tragic one in "The Return Of Harmony Part 2", after Discord has mind-controlled all her friends into jerks who have been bullying her the entire episode, and as a result, the Elements Of Harmony fizzle out the moment they try to use them on him. Her friends break up, and after mentioning With Friends Like These... about those she cared the most about and then realising what she just said, poor Twilight loses her colors like they did, along with all hope. She somberly walks back to her home, too depressed to take notice of the utter chaos Discord had plunged the world into around her, and prepares to leave forever.
      • In "Lesson Zero", Twilight starts unhinging completely when she can't think of an aesop to write her weekly letter to Princess Celestia on, and thinks this means she'll be forced to return to Canterlot and get sent back to Magic Kindergarten. Comes complete with The Un-Smile, nervous twitching, Madness Makeover, and psychotic emotional manipulation experiments that drive the entire town into a Big Ball of Violence.
      • Twilight starts having another one in "A Canterlot Wedding" when everyone she cares about walks out on her angrily after she bursts in on her brother's wedding rehearsal declaring that the bride Princess Cadenza is evil. After she sends her away crying, her brother explains why all her behaviour that Twilight observed was due to stress of having to take care of everything alone or Not What It Looks Like and then practically disowns her. Then her True Companions walk out after him, and finally even Princess Celestia (who in Twilight's words right in the first episode "trusts me completely" and "has never once doubted me"). The ensuing Heroic BSOD barely has time to get started, however, before Princess Cadenza comes back in, soothes her and responds to her apology by explaining that she will be sorry, before raising green flames from the ground and grinning diabolically as they bear Twilight down through the floor into an unknown darkness. After that, Twilight has worries other than having unfairly accused her.
    • Rarity is a talented artist (whose field happens to be making dresses) who takes her career seriously and loves being the centre of the admiration of others. In "Suited for Success", she gets extremely neurotic when she hears a famous fashion guru is going to come see the ridiculous dresses she ended up creating by trying to please her friends' clueless wishes to the letter, and locks herself up in her room to angst furiously after the show is a predictable disaster.
    • Rainbow Dash is cocky and justifiably proud of her flying abilities, and wants to be sure everyone sees how awesome she is. In "Sonic Rainboom", she's reduced to shivering in a Troubled Fetal Position when she loses confidence and realises she's bitten off more than she can chew in building her performance in a major competition on a trick so difficult she almost certainly won't be able to repeat it, meaning she would fail spectacularly in front of everybody.
    • Pinkie Pie is a friendly, happy, very social Cloudcuckoolander who loves throwing great parties and takes friendship very seriously. In "Party of One", she basically suffers a psychotic break when she thinks her friends don't like her parties anymore and want to be rid of her. She starts holding a party with inanimate objects, alternating between giving them voices and suffering crazed spasms.
    • Fluttershy is usually a kind, shy pony with a talent for communicating with animals, but nervous around other ponies and insecure of herself.
      • In "The Best Night Ever", after her attempts at befriending all the interesting animals she'd been looking forward to seeing fail for some unexplained reason, she breaks down in more hostile attempts to capture animals. Eventually, she shouts her infamous "You're — going to — LOVE ME!" while chasing the animals inside a ballroom. Mind you, there are also bears, cranes, kangaroos, and turtles, not just tiny critters. The situation was resolved quickly, though, and not much thought was given to the breakdown in-universe. (The episode was about all the main characters, so no one of them got much screen time.)
      • In "Putting Your Hoof Down", Fluttershy gets "assertiveness" training from the Minotaur Iron Will. It seems to work, but actually causes her to start acting like a bully, lashing out with little provocation to maintain an artificially inflated but easily threatened self-esteem. After giving a Breaking Lecture to two of her best friends that sends them away crying, she has a My God, What Have I Done? moment and imprisons herself inside her own house for fear of hurting someone else again.
      • And for that matter, there's also her breakdown in "Hurricane Fluttershy" after her wing power is measured at .5, leading her to have a massive panic attack when she remembers all the times she was made fun of because she's been a weak flier compared to other pegasi. Is it any wonder the poor girl's The Woobie on the show?
  • An episode from the first season of Mucha Lucha sends Buena Girl through this when she mistakenly receives a fortune donut that says she's a disgrace to masked wrestling.
  • In the Recess episode "I Will Kick No More Forever", Vince underwent a massive Heroic BSOD (of the severe depression type) after his best kick was not only beaten out, but beaten out by an Ashley, who not only doesn't even regularly play Kickball, but isn't even playing it seriously (she basically kicked it all the way to Communist China non-chalantly while she was speaking on her cell phone.). It literally had to take TJ and his friends some severe talks to Vince (as well as almost faking out his kick to making him feel better with a more bouncy ball than usual) to not only get him out of the Heroic BSOD, but also for him to manage in doing an unprecedented account of kicking the ball outside of the stratosphere.
    • Similarly, in another episode, TJ ended up suffering a Heroic BSOD in a similar manner to Vince after one of his schemes (namely one that he intended to use to get back a baseball bat that the Ashleys managed to steal from them) backfired horribly that not only resulted in Gus's injury, but also got his friends detention, refused to plan anymore and went into a depressed state. It wasn't until his friends, in a usage of Reverse Psychology, attempted to make TJ seem like he was a bad planner, as well as their attempts at planning that was even worse, that he managed to get out of that state, and successfully managed to retrieve the bat from the Ashleys, as well.
    • Although technically not a hero, Ms. Finster suffered the depression type after her leg ended up broken as a result of the bag she was using to confiscate candy breaking and causing her leg to become injured. She attempts to control the playground in spite of her injury, but becomes immensely depressed when she realized her injured state actually resulted in the children no longer fearing her and thus unable to allow her to control them. Man, the creators of Recess just love this type of Heroic BSOD.
  • Tigger gets one in an episode of The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh after his hero persona, "The Masked Offender," is humiliated due to a prank by the other woodland residents. He gets better after Piglet attempts to take on the "Whatchamadingle," by himself when the prank ends up backfiring on everyone else and putting their lives in danger.
  • Billy from Adventure Time (voiced by Lou Ferrigno) retires to his legendary crack[1] after reasoning that bad things will keep happening despite his efforts. Finn and Jake help him get better.
  • In Young Justice, the events of "Failsafe" caused various Heroic BSODs throughout the episode, from Wally's reaction to Artemis's death to M'Gann's reaction to... well, everything. In fact, the following episode "Disordered" is all about them coming to terms with the trauma and taking steps to get past their respective BSODs. Luckily for them, there are totally therapists.
    • Beast Boy has a small one in season two when he comes across a landscape that causes him to have flashbacks about his mother's murder.
  • Dee Dee, though not necessarily a hero, has one in Dexter's Laboratory, in the episode "Down In the Dumps" when she loses Mr. Fuzzums.
  • In the Batman: The Animated Series episode "I Am The Night", Batman suffers one when his annual visit to Crime Alley (and the spot where his parents died) lead to him being late for a sting operation, leading to Commissioner Gordon being severely wounded, leading to Bruce quit being Batman. It wasn't until the criminal who shot Gordon escaped and a disgusted Robin decided to go after him that Bruce started to snap out of it and Gordon's own doubts about the sting helped him come to for good.
  • Scrooge McDuck routinely has these on DuckTales (1987), particularly when it involves him losing (or coming close to losing) all his wealth. "A sea monster ate my ice cream!" anyone?
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  1. ↑ in a mountainside, you dingdong
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