Robots
Weren't those robots at the end of AI?

Col. Dax? Dave Bowman? Spartacus? Are these not heros in successful films? Or do you mean the heros themselves are not successful? I would argue Dave Bowman is not exactly defeated at the end of 2001.

Bill James
He self-published his Baseball Abstracts at first, and that went on to cause a revolution in how baseball talent is evaluated. So chalk up another one for self-publishing!