Destination Imagination is the third and final Made-for-TV Movie for the series Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends. Premiering on November 27, 2008, the movie falls somewhere in the sixth season of the show, depending on how you watch it^note In airing order, it falls in the middle of the season, but by production order - the order we're following - it's the Grand Finale to the show.

This time, the Foster's crew receives a mysterious box that is not to be opened, but when Frankie directly disobeys Mr. Herriman's orders not to peek inside, she finds herself in a glorious kingdom inhabited by one lonely imaginary friend. Frankie continues to visit the box each day, and her friend grows so attached to her that he eventually decides not to let her go, and it's up to Mac, Bloo, Coco, Wilt, and Eduardo to rescue her, as they come to realize that the seemingly harmless world inside the box isn't all it appears to be.

The film provides examples of:

• Ambiguous Situation: We never get the details behind why World's creator's parents sent World to Foster's, locked up in a toy chest with instructions not to let him out. Judging by their dialogue, it can be inferred that World tried to essentially kidnap him and keep him in his realm forever.
• Animation Bump: Downplayed. The character animation is about the same as the show but there are some sequences that become more impressive in terms of visuals, notably the chase scene during the films climax.
• Anti-Villain: World may be the most powerful and intense threat that the series ever had but he's really not a villain. He's actually a sweet kid who just has some serious emotional baggage due to his abandonment issues.
• Bait-and-Switch: When Frankie tries to leave the castle, the doors slam shut while World states that she didn't have to leave, as if to say World is forcefully trapping her there. When Mac and the others storm the castle to save her, they find her happily getting a massage. Turns out she agreed to World's point of view.
• "Be Quiet!" Nudge: Mac gives one to Bloo after he tries to reiterate that World is crazy, even though it was revealed that the latter only carried out his actions out of fear of losing Frankie and being abandoned once again.^note  (However, considering that the former and his friends almost got killed while being stuck in the miniature doll-house, it is really that hard to blame him...)
• Big Bad: World is definitely the most intense villain from the series. He's more of an Anti-Villain, though, as all he wants is friends.
• Big "NO!": World unleashes this after Mr. Herriman angrily scolds him, causing a humongous Villainous Breakdown from World's part.
• Brick Joke: When Frankie first enters World, she scribbles something on a cardboard tree (see Curse Cut Short). When Eduardo finds the tree, Wilt immediately scribbles the word out. After Herriman causes World to break apart and they find that tree again, he reads what is written and is shocked at what he sees, only for Frankie to get it over with quickly.
• Broken Bridge: The musical piano bridge thanks to World trying to make sure the heroes don't get to Frankie.
• Big Word Shout: Mr. Herriman shouts "STOP!" when Frankie and the others are arguing over whether or not to let World out, which leads to him admitting that he was absolutely wrong at scolding her and is trusting her judgment.
• Bowled Over: While traveling through a world resembling that of the underground stage in Super Mario Bros. 1, Wilt rolls a snail shell like a bowling ball to knock over the Silly Putty clones of Mac and the imaginary friends.
• Call-Back: Mac is the only one who doesn't eat the sleeping powder-laced crumpets because of said container being labeled "powdered sugar" and he has adverse reactions to the stuff.
• Character Development: Some there between Frankie and Mr. Herriman to the point where Mr. Herriman admits that it was wrong of him to act so harsh and judgmental towards her.
• Clone Army: When Bloo and the gang fall into the silly-putty-like glob pool, the putty rises into images of them.
• Convenient Replacement Character: Mr. Herriman tries to replace Frankie after she disappears. The first (Emmy, who looks exactly like Frankie, only with longer hair and a Mojo Jojo shirt) runs off after seeing all of Frankie's duties, a second look-a-like who is male, and several other workers (who Herriman instantly fires over little things).
• Curse Cut Short: There is some profanity found in a scene when the gang looks for Frankie and finds her "written" honest thought about Herriman. Although you won't see clearly what it says, when Eduardo reads it, he reads: "Herriman is a big fat..." Then Wilt censors it before he could say it aloud. It's theorized for fans that the last word is "Asshole!".
• Darker and Edgier: Noticeably more so than the series and the other TV movies. It was even rated TV-PG.
• Deconstruction:
  • This movie deconstructs the mistreatment and the lack of respect that Frankie had gotten from not only Mr. Herriman, but most of the residents at Fosters. Herriman and the residents would always rely on Frankie for everything and she will get little to no gratitude for her good deeds. This leads to her wanting to permanently stay in the toy box that World had her live in because she's actually allowed to relax and unwind for once.
  • Mr. Herriman's Mean Boss ways is also deconstructed. For once, he suffers some realistic consequences. When Frankie ditches Foster, he even has issues finding replacements. One of them outright left when she saw how ridiculous Heriman's demands were. Herriman would even end up firing other workers for simple mistakes too, thus leaving him with no workers and having no choice but to try to get Frankie back. This is eventually reconstructed in the end when Herriman learns to appreciate Frankie and even creates a chores act so Frankie doesn't have to do all the chores in the house again.
• Diegetic Soundtrack Usage: After all the chores are finished, all the imaginary friends in the house are free to travel in and out of the toy box, where they enjoy themselves.
• Down the Rabbit Hole: Frankie enters World through the Toy Box that he's kept in.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: Mr. Herriman's general dismissal of Frankie is increased even further here, as he does not see how her way of doing things actually benefits the imaginary friends, nor does he appreciate how she works herself to exhaustion every single day, even after he's forced to take on her chores himself. Frankie even chews Mac and the others out for wanting her back, not because she's their friend, but rather for all the chores she does for them. The end of the special has Mr. Herriman finally accept that Frankie isn't the irresponsible layabout he's viewed her as for years, but is instead a vital part of Foster's, who is deserving of respect and appreciation, being the only one to trust her decision to let World out of the box. Afterwards, everyone is now seen taking part in helping Frankie finish her chores thanks to Herriman enacting a "Fair Chores" Act.
• Earn Your Happy Ending: Frankie is now respected by Mr. Herriman and has the other Imaginary Friends help her out with her chores. Meanwhile, World can freely travel throughout the real world and have the other imaginary friends have fun with him in his world.
• Everyone Has Standards: When Mr. Herriman starts scolding World, even Bloo looks on in horror.
• Faceless Masses: Quite literally every "inhabitant" of the toy box until World uses their bodies.
• Five-Second Foreshadowing: The musical bridge needs every note played in the right order for the heroes to pass. So when the ranger intentionally presses on the wrong key just as the heroes were close to completing it, it's a sign that he's not the heroic figure he's made out to be.
  • When Mac and Mr. Herriman are about to open the door to the attic, one would think they would meet each other since Mac and his friends thought they are home with the toy chest missing, but Mr. Herriman opens the door to find the chest and Mac is nowhere to be in sight, not even in front of him. This lets us know, given Mac uneasy feeling, that they aren't back home and have been shrunken down and stuffed in a miniature doll house replica of Foster's.
• Flippant Forgiveness: Bloo towards World.^note  (To be fair, Bloo somewhat had a point to still hold a grudge against World, considering that he almost died while being shaken around in the doll-house.)
• Foreshadowing: The bedtime story Frankie tells an imaginary friend near the start of the movie has a line that says how the princess finally got respected. World treats Frankie like she's a princess when she enters the toy box and in the end, all the imaginary friends give her the appreciation and thanks she deserves.
  • When Mac and Bloo and their friends travel through the toy chest, they came across the inhabitants that don't have any faces, but three distinctive characters have a face and one tooth. When one of them gets copied, the copy didn't have a face. This clues in that the imaginary friend is one person that can movie his face to any object in his pocket dimension.
• Futile Hand Reach: Frankie does this when her and the other friends witness Mr. Herriman scolding World, who is on the verge of a serious breakdown while being scolded.
• Freudian Excuse: World was locked up in a box and taken away from his creator due to him being super powerful. This explains why he is so emotionally hurt and has some serious abandonment issues.
• Genre Savvy: Mac turns the tables on the puppy who gave them crumpets laced with sleeping powder because of how it was covered in powdered sugar.
• Grand Finale: While the final episode to air was "Goodbye to Bloo", this movie was the final episode produced. Both the fans and creators agree that it is the true wrap up to the series.
• Heel–Face Turn: World changes for the better in the end.
• I Just Want to Have Friends: World's motivation, since his creator's parents locked him up and left him at the doorstep of Foster's.
• Instant Sedation: Twice—once when World drugs the gang (sans Mac) with sleeping-powder laced crumpets, and again when World uses a magic sleeping gas to knock them out and trap them in a dollhouse version of Foster's.
• Interrupted Cooldown Hug: Happens when Frankie had just calmed World down and made him friendly towards her friends, when Mr. Herriman comes barging in and basically reinforces every one of his fears in one fell swoop before attempting to push everyone out of the toy chest. Cue the Unstoppable Rage that literally tears the entire reality of the toy chest apart.
  Herriman: Good heavens! What's happening?
  Bloo: You peeved him off ^note the closed captions say "pissed", THAT'S WHAT'S HAPPENING!
• "It" Is Dehumanizing: In the opening scene, we see a couple hauling a chained-up toy chest into their car. When their young son (who we later learn is World's creator) comes outside, we get this exchange.
  Boy: Mommy? Daddy?
  Boy's Mother: (picks him up) It's okay, sweetie. (hugs him) You're safe now.
  Boy's Father: I'm taking it to a place where it can't keep you away from us anymore. Everything's going to be all right.
• Jerkass Has a Point:
  • When World traps Frankie within the castle, he makes a valid point that it's better here because at least she's cared for. Given how the first thing out of everyone else's mouth when they find her is "Who's going to take care of X for me?", they're not wrong. Even Frankie chews them out for how they truly "care" for her.
  • Bloo's response to Herriman questioning how and why World is going on a meltdown is because Herriman managed to push his Trauma Button while Frankie was just seconds away from calming him down.
• Kill It with Fire: At one point, Coco lays an egg with a flamethrower inside, though she never actually kills anything with it, but instead uses it to melt the plastic ball river into slag.
• Mass "Oh, Crap!": Frankie, Mac, Bloo, Coco, Wilt, and Eduardo when they watch Mr. Herriman scold World, who begins suffering a panic attack.
• Meaningful Echo: Frankie diffuses a situation between Bloo and Eduardo on being the hero, with Eduardo repeating what Frankie told him in order to stand up to World in the last act.
• Morality Pet: Frankie is this to World.
• Mr. Vice Guy: Despite technically being the films antagonist, World is actually a sweet kid. He just has some serious emotional baggage due to his abandonment issues.
• My God, What Have I Done?: Mr. Herriman immediately regrets scolding World when he sees the landscape break down and gets called out for it by Bloo, who was horrified by the scolding himself.
  Mr. Herriman: Good heavens! What's happening?!
  Bloo: You peeved^note The closed captions say "pissed" him off, THAT'S WHAT'S HAPPENING!
• Once More, with Clarity: World seals the doors of the castle when Frankie suggests she wants to leave, with this being the last time we see Frankie for a good while in the film. When the gang finally gets to the castle to save her, it turns out she's there of her own volition, having immediately agreed with him that she doesn't have to leave, since this is the one place she's actually treated with respect.
• One-Winged Angel: Mr. Herriman makes the mistake of verbally threatening World, an emotionally unstable Reality Warper, with the thing he fears most, to be sealed away alone again. World replies by destroying his imaginary world and transforming into a massive chimera creature to try and reclaim Frankie, the only person in years who has treated him with kindness. It actually works out pretty well for him, as no one can really stop him until Frankie calms the poor kid down.
• OOC Is Serious Business: During Herriman's scolding on World, even Bloo looks horrified at the meltdown about to ensue and chews Mr. Herriman out for his harsh words.
• Ordered Apology: Frankie does this for both World and Bloo. She's more kindly with World, but gives a flat-out order to Bloo.
• Poor Communication Kills: When Mac, Bloo, Eduardo, Wilt, and Coco find Frankie and tell her they need her back at Foster's, Frankie is upset because they came all this way to do their chores. After being shrunken down and put in a model doll house of Foster's, Wilt lampshades Frankie misinterpreted what they really meant by, which was only after the World shrinks them in attempt to get rid of them.
  • Mr. Herriman does this that almost got himself, Frankie, Mac, and Imaginary Friends in hot water. After scolding World and reassuring he will be alone in the toy chest, World suffered a Villainous Breakdown and Unstoppable Rage.
• Precision F-Strike: Somewhat. Bloo tells Mr. Herriman that he peeved World off, but an error in the closed captions on the original airing had him say pissed instead. The voice actor has since said that he was supposed to say ‘peeved’, but he misread his line and said ‘pissed’ instead.
• Put on a Bus: Played for Laughs. Madame Foster has been absent for most of the events. The mid-credits scene reveals that Madame Foster has been on vacation this whole time. Cue a look of confusion as she's greeted with an empty foyer, wondering where everyone had gone.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech:
  • Frankie gives a big one to Bloo, Mac, Coco, Wilt, and Eduardo because they tried to rescue and bring her back home for selfish reasons, not because she was their friend. Namely, they described all of the things that she did for them, and not any of the things that they did together with her.
    Frankie: Oh I get it. You didn't come to rescue me because you missed me. You missed all the stuff I used to do for you!
    Mac: Wha? No, we—
    Frankie: Well, you can forget it! I'm sick of taking care of everyone and everything and never getting a word of thanks, an ounce of help, or a tiny little smidgen of respect! You guys are just like Mr. Herriman! I'm just a servant to you! Well, guess what? In this world, I'm the one who's taken care of, and that's the way I like it!
  • Herriman gives one to World that inadvertently causes him to snap right after Frankie had finally calmed him down.
    Mr. Herriman: You, young man, are a bad, bad, bad, bad boy! Luring a naïve young woman into this silly little imaginary world and keeping her from her duties! Tsk, tsk, tsk! Shame on you! Now, I am taking Miss Francis and these insubordinate whippersnappers over here back to their rightful home! And YOU, young man, you shall stay here in this toy chest alone and think long and hard about what you have done!
• Sealed Evil in a Teddy Bear: The purple puppy seeing that it's World using the puppy as its body.
• Secretly Selfish: Subverted with Bloo, because he’s always been a self-centered imaginary friend. But the trope applies to Mac, Coco, Eduardo, and Wilt, because when they find Frankie, they only talk about the things that she did for them as the reason for why they were trying to rescue her. Given what she goes through at Foster's, Frankie's anger is very justified.
• Scenery Porn: The interior of World is creative and beautiful.
• Slow Clap: Not actually a clap, but Mac is the first to accept World's more sincere apology, and then the others follow.
• Take That!: One of Frankie's replacements is a British nanny with a magic umbrella. When she comes to the door singing, Mr. Herriman's response is "You're fired!" and he slams the door in her face.
• Tampering with Food and Drink: The puppy dusts his crumpets with sleeping powder disguised as sugar. Mac is the only one who avoids this, since he has adverse reactions with sugar.
• Terrible Interviewees Montage: Mr. Herriman interviews several replacements for Frankie when she disappears. The interviewees include a young woman named Amy (who looks like Frankie with longer hair and a different shirt), a Distaff Counterpart of Frankie named Francis, two unnamed women, and a Mary Poppins expy. Though in this case, the interviewees are just fine. It’s the interviewer who’s terrible: Mr. Herriman, who fires each of them for making a tiny mistake (except Amy, who hit the road when she saw the huge workload she’d have to deal with).
• Trash of the Titans: Thanks to Frankie's long absence, Foster's becomes a huge mess. Herriman's firing of replacements due to them not living up to his expectations of having everything perfect, and his attempts to clean the house himself, don't help matters.
• Unimpressive Progress Reveal: After failing to find a suitable replacement for Frankie, Mr. Herriman decides that he can do her chores by himself. He is then seen admiring a floor that he mopped clean, only for it to zoom out to reveal that he's only finished a small patch and the rest of the floor is still dirty. To top it all off, Jackie soon after reveals that it took Herriman two days just to clean that much.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: Herriman interferes with a resolution between World 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.
  Herriman: Good heavens! What's happening?
  Bloo: You peeved him off ^note the closed captions say "pissed", that's what's happening!!
• Wham Shot: When the protagonists meet up with a ranger to cross a rainbow bridge — who only lets you go if you play back its musical sequence in the right order — the ranger deliberately steps on the wrong key.
• White-and-Grey Morality: While World is easily the most intense and powerful antagonist the series ever had, he really is just an emotionally hurt imaginary friend who has a lot of anxiety caused by his abandonment issues. Aside from that, he really is not that bad.
• White Void Room: What World turns into after his breakdown.
• Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds: World. He just wants someone to play with and has severe abandonment issues.