Line #65 Main/ScantronPicture


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2	%% Image selected per Image Pickin' thread: https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/posts.php?discussion=16791563370.89843600
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5	[[quoteright:350:[[WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddparents https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/cosmo_con_test.png]]]]
6	[[caption-width-right:350:Literal points for creativity.]]
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8	->'''Britta:''' Alright, who did a butt?\
9	'''Troy:''' They're boobs. And I don't know.
10	-->-- ''{{Series/Community}}''
11
12	Optical answers sheets, known as ''Scantrons'' after the company that manufactures them, are a form used to record answers on multiple-choice tests. The test-taker marks their answer on the sheet by filling in a small bubble. Afterwards, the answer sheet is fed through a scanner which detects the filled bubbles and automatically scores the test. This allows an administrator to grade enormous amounts of exams with little effort.
13
14	When a character is less than scholarly or doesn't know the answer to any of the questions, they will color the dots on the page so that it resembles a monochrome bitmap picture when viewed. Oftentimes the graphic is a phrase or a funny or offensive image. Naturally, this will cause them to fail the test [[note]]The graphic generally requires them to fill in more than one dot per answer, or leave some answers blank, eliminating the minor possibility that they might coincidentally happen to fill in a box that corresponds to the right answer[[/note]], or they could end up [[AchievementsInIgnorance passing with flying colors]].
15
16	----
17	!!Examples:
18	[[foldercontrol]]
19
20	[[folder:Advertising]]
21	* UsefulNotes/McDonalds: One [[Website/{{Twitter}} tweet]] from their official account promoting [=McCafe=] shows [[https://twitter.com/McDonalds/status/930503153115648003/ a video]] of Scantron dots rearranging themselves to read "Need Coffee".
22	[[/folder]]
23
24	[[folder:Anime & Manga]]
25	* ''Anime/IsekaiQuartet'': Ainz manages to get 100% on a test because he realizes that Pandora's Actor had made the correct answers to the test form a picture of his own face on the scantron.
26	* ''[[Creator/{{Sanrio}} Gudetama]]'' makes a picture of himself on a scantron in [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItAKMyPUG6Q episode 467]].
27	[[/folder]]
28
29	[[folder:Comic Strips]]
30	* [[BrilliantButLazy Caulfield]] does this as a RunningGag in ''ComicStrip/{{Frazz}}''. He uses the dots to write out music notes (or Braille, or UPC codes), and later recreates the Mona Lisa.
31	[[/folder]]
32
33	[[folder:Films -- Animation]]
34	* In ''WesternAnimation/ThePeanutsMovie'', Peppermint Patty makes a smiley face on her scantron early on in the film. Unlike most examples, [[spoiler:this serves as a ChekhovsGun when Charlie Brown gets an award for being the first kid to score a 100% on the standardized test. When he looks at the winning scantron, he sees a smiley face. Turns out, he and Peppermint Patty [[FileMixUp signed each other's tests by mistake]].]]
35	[[/folder]]
36
37	[[folder:Films -- Live-Action]]
38	* The young Speed does this in the ''Film/SpeedRacer'' movie, coloring the bubbles to read GO REX GO.
39	* In ''Film/WhosTheMan,'' Ed Lover and Dr Dre attempt to deliberately fail the police exam by filling out the bubbles to spell out "abacadaba". [[TheUnreveal It's never made clear]] whether [[SpringtimeForHitler they actually pass the test]] or if someone pulls strings behind-the-scenes to "adjust" their score.
40	[[/folder]]
41
42	[[folder:Live-Action TV]]
43	* Both played straight and subverted in ''Series/{{Community}}''. Britta has the group do psychology tests, and, true to form, one of them comes back bearing a pair of boobs (see page quote). However, Britta then becomes annoyed with the rest of the group for all drawing a penis on the Scantron sheets. The rest of the group asks to see them and it turns out Britta was just [[FreudianSlip seeing penises where there weren't any]].
44	-->'''Britta''': [[MirthlessLaughter Ha ha!]] Gotcha! [[JustTestingYou This was also a test]], and you all [[DiggingYourselfDeeper penised]]... ''passed''... maybe I need to take one. A ''test'', not a penis.
45	* An episode of ''Series/GrowingPains'' had Mike score high on an IQ test after drawing a picture of a tree on the answer sheet.
46	* In ''Series/ParkerLewisCantLose'', Larry Kubiac got the highest score on a test in the school, leading Ms. Musso to wonder how he did it. TheReveal then shows he wrote "EAT NOW!"
47	* In ''Series/MyNameIsEarl'', Randy draws a sailboat with dots representing him and a bunch of hot chicks during the GED exam.
48	* In ''Series/NedsDeclassifiedSchoolSurvivalGuide'', Ned doodles on an answer sheet instead of actually taking his test. [[AchievementsInIgnorance He manages to get an A for his efforts]].
49	* In ''Series/TheGoldbergs'', Barry Goldberg's refusal to take multiple-choice exams seriously is noticed when his scantron sheets show a TV show logo, a goofy dog, and an unflattering caricature of his mother.
50	* In the live-action portions of ''[[Creator/OneSaturdayMorningAndABCKids One Saturday Morning]]'', the host would sometimes end by telling the viewers "the answers to next week's quiz questions". In one case, she encouraged the viewers to fill in the bubbles so they looked like Manny the Uncanny's face.
51	[[/folder]]
52
53	[[folder:Western Animation]]
54	* ''WesternAnimation/HeyArnold:'' In "Apptitude Test," Harold doesn't bother even doing his test, and instead, fills in the bubbles to resemble a large letter 'H'.
55	* ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls:'' Him once gives the girls such a test in a challenge, and although Blossom and Buttercup take the test seriously, they fail as a result. Much to the shock of Blossom, Buttercup, and Him, Bubbles passes, and it turns out she filled in the bubbles in the shape of a flower.
56	-->'''Him''': ''(Stunned)'' Well, I'll be darned.
57	* ''WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons''
58	** In "[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS20E11HowTheTestWasWon How the Test Was Won]]", Bart fills in the bubbles to write "slurp my snot" on a practice test for the upcoming Vice President's Assessment Test.
59	** In "Lisa Simpson, This Isn't Your Life", Lisa discovers that Marge used to be smart like her until her senior year of high school, around the time she started dating Homer. She finds an old scantron where Marge filled in the bubbles in the shape of a heart, with the phrase "Screw it! I'm in love!" written inside it.
60	** Subversion in "Diary Queen". Bart considers drawing a skull, only for a vision of the skull on the test to tell him not to squander the potential he thinks [[spoiler:(and rightfully so)]] the late Mrs. Krabappel saw in him, leading Bart to actually try on the test.
61	* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/ActionLeagueNow'' has The Flesh getting kicked out of the league because he failed a first grade equivalency test after coloring the dots in the shape of a cat. The episode ends with him retaking the test and passing because he colored the dots in the shape of a dog instead.
62	* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/AmericanDragonJakeLong'' shows that Spud has a collection of Scantron test papers from failed tests with the bubbles filled in to form a picture of Lincoln's Last Supper.
63	* The plot of the "Cosmo Con" episode of ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddParents'' is kicked off with one of these, with Crocker assuming that Timmy used magic to cheat (not being aware that it's against 'Da Rules' to use magic to cheat at tests or contests) because he actually got an A+. In reality, Timmy just filled the dots into the shape of a smiley face. The other students take this as a SignOfTheApocalypse.
64	-->'''Timmy''': Thank you, [[AttentionDeficitOohShiny short attention span]].
65	* In ''WesternAnimation/MakingFiends'', Charlotte does better on a SortingAlgorithmOfEvil than Vendetta by drawing a picture on the answer sheet. Naturally, Vendetta tries to learn from this EvilGenius
66	* The ''WesternAnimation/{{Recess}}'' episode "My Fair Gretchen" begins with the students taking a standardized test. Mikey fills in the bubbles to make a smiley face.
67	* Similarly, in the episode of ''WesternAnimation/MyGymPartnersAMonkey'' where Adam gets stuck with the spiffies, he only did so because he took a standardized test seriously. Everyone else intentionally flunked, with Jake drawing a smiley face with his test bubbles.
68	* In one episode of ''WesternAnimation/YakkityYak'', Yakkity draws a picture of his own face on a Scantron.
69	* ''WesternAnimation/TheEmperorsNewSchool'': In "[[GrandFinale Graduation Groove]]", Kuzco isn't ready to become Emperor yet, so he tries to purposefully fail his exam by doing this so that it looks like his face. It backfires when he ends up passing the exam.
70	* The ''WesternAnimation/DarkwingDuck'' episode "Whiffle While You Work" has Gosalyn fill in the dots on her math homework to draw a side view of Whiffle Boy's head.
71	[[/folder]]
72
73	[[folder:Real Life]]
74	* In his book ''Pigsticking'', Creator/WillieRushton explained that the old British Football Pools were a sort of lottery predicated on the number of drawn matches on any Saturday's football fixtures. Competitors bought "lines" or "permutations" depending on making crosses on a grid next to the fixtures. If any one line of crosses coincided with scoredraws, it won a variable amount of cash from the pool. Effectively, the Pools form was an early form of scantron: at first manually checked at a central office, later on computerisation took the manual labour out of it. [[note]]The Pools hardly exist today, superceded both by the National Lottery and by the demands of satellite television: not all that many games kick off at three on a Saturday these days. The competition relied on all the games on the card kicking off simultaneously on a Saturday afternoon.[[/note]] Rushton used to design his permutations so that the crosses on the scantron sheet, read top-to-bottom, spelt out '''OH SHIT!''' He visualised the look on the face of the girl checker in Liverpool, later in the week...
75	[[/folder]]

Context Main / ScantronPicture