Plaster Cast Doodling

"I think the best time to add insult to injury is when you're signing someone's cast. 'You're a dick! You deserved this! Also, I'm sorry I broke your leg.'"

— Demetri Martin

Someone gets into an accident. They get taken to the hospital, and they have their injuries treated and wrapped up nicely in a cast or bandage. Or perhaps they just sustained Amusing Injuries, and the scene or panel quickly shows their injured limbs encased in a plaster cast. The cause may vary. Regardless, the character in question either starts drawing and doodling on their cast, or someone else close to them leaves a signature on their cast.

Depending on the circumstances this happens in, this trope could be played out in various different ways. If the injured character does it themselves, it may be because they might've found the bandage too bland and boring and thought of giving it more life and color by drawing on it. That or they're too passionate about drawing; they can't go one minute without drawing, even if it's on an orthopedic cast. If someone else does it to the injured character, then it could say something about that person. For example, the prankster or the bully would draw a penis in which humiliation and hilarity ensue. But maybe their friend is nice enough to write encouraging words like "get well soon!", "don't get hurt again!", or draw a heart, etc. and a heartwarming moment ensues. The point is: the possibilities are endless.

A case of Truth in Television, as people in real life tend to be creative with the drawings and writings on their or others' orthopedic casts.

Sistertrope to Face Doodling. See also Suntan Stencil for when something is written/drawn on a sunbathing person, which appears after the tan lines develop. This might take place in an Injured Limb Episode.

---

Examples:

Advertising

• A Doritos commercial had a hospitalized man in a body cast be at the mercy of a random small boy. Among his antics include tickling his feet, placing his (thankfully empty) bedpan on his head like a hat and drawing a bikini on his chest in sharpie.

Comic Books

• The The Baby-Sitters Club graphic novel Claudia and the Bad Joke has Claudia's friends and fellow sitters doodle all over her cast once she's home, with Kristy writing "Kristy is Awesome" during a visit.
• After Aeturnum (Michael Marchand) from Spider-Woman (2020) breaks Jessica's arm she goes to Night Nurse's Clinic where Linda Carter wraps her arm in a cast that already has writings on it, including "I hope it hurt! JK JK^note abbreviation of joking (mostly)", a couple "feel better soon, bestie", and "I made all my spaceships stick shift, so you can't steal them" each signed with their names.

Fan Works

• Oni Ga Shiku Series: After Izuku returns from the hospital to class after the Nomu in USJ broke his arm, he tells all his classmates that this is their chance to doodle on the cast. Some of them, like Ashido, jump on the oportunity. He gets rid of the cast later that day thanks to Recovery Girl's healing quirk because the Sports Festival is a week away and he doesn't want to miss out on training.
• In the Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends fanfic Wilt Breaks a Leg, the leg cast Wilt receives upon getting a bone broken there is written on by most of the show's main characters, leaving a number of encouraging messages on it. The only exception is Bloo, who (as well as taking Wilt's accident to his advantage by deliberately trying to hurt himself) writes an unspecified "curse word" that Mac scolds him for.

Films — Live-Action

• The biographical movie Frida shows Frida sustaining a near-death accident that leaves her hospitalized for a month with several surgeries and full-body casts. Immobilized, she draws colorful butterflies on her body cast.
• It (2017): Gretta asks to sign Eddie's arm cast, and he shyly lets her... and is dismayed to see she wrote "LOSER" on it in big black letters. Later, he uses a red marker to change it to "LOVER."
• Stranger Than Fiction: In the end, Anna draws a watch with a smiley face on Harold's arm cast, after his real watch inadvertently saves him from death.

Literature

• The titular character of Big Nate Goes for Broke ends up breaking his arm and getting a plaster cast on it. A girl from Jefferson Middle School asks to sign it, only for her to write an insulting message about Nate's own school.
• In Christine, Arnie signs Dennis' cast after Dennis is injured at a football game. Later, after he noticed Arnie's personality has changed, Dennis asks him to sign the cast on a different spot; this time, his signature looks completely different as a result of Christine, and by extension, the ghost of LeBay taking over Arnie's personality.
• Diary of a Wimpy Kid: In the first book, Rowley breaks his hand and it's put in a cast, which gives him attention from other students who want to sign it. Greg gets jealous of the attention, so he wraps his arm in gauze, pretends he has an infected splinter, and offers students to sign his "sympathy sheet" (a clipboard). The only one who wants to sign it is Fregley, who wants to look at Greg's alleged infection.
• The McGurk Organization: When McGurk is laid up with a broken ankle in The Case of the Wiggling Wig, the other Organization members get a chance to write on his cast. Later, he winds up using his cast to doodle notes for the case.
• After Sueharu saves Shirokusa from a staircase fall in Osamake, he breaks one of his arms and then gets it bandaged with a cast. Ooragi Shion, being The Gadfly she is and full of herself, writes "Shion-chan the genius was here" on his cast while he was asleep. She pretends she didn't write it after he sees it even though her name is written on it.
• In Night Watch Discworld, when two of the Cable Street Particulars, Ankh-Morpork's State Sec, comes after Vimes, Vimes knocks one of them out and then drags him to Dr "Mossy" Lawn's clinic, unconscious and with a broken arm. Lawn, who has treated some of the Particulars' victims, suggests Vimes could hit the man in some sensitive areas, offering to point some out, but Vimes says he wants him fully treated, and then he'll sign the cast. Lawn admits that that is a very sensitive area.

Live-Action TV

• Played for Drama in Cobra Kai. After Hawk breaks Demetri's arm in "Miyagi Do," Demetri shows up to school with a cast in episode 7. He's then bullied by Kyler, who draws a penis on his cast, causing everyone to laugh at him. In an act of compassion, Yasmine fixes Demetri's cast by writing, "I love your big dick," and signing it.
• Goosebumps (1995): In "Say Cheese and Die!", Greg's dad got into a car accident which is caused by a cursed camera that can predict the future. His family visited him in the hospital and wrote messages on his leg cast.
• Golden Girls: In "Feelings," substitute teacher Dorothy refuses to give a passing grade to Kevin, an athlete who has not earned it, which will bench him for an upcoming game. After pressure from the faculty goes from requests to outright threats, she reluctantly passes him so he can play—only for Laser-Guided Karma to hit when Kevin breaks his leg during the match. Dorothy visits him at the hospital and discovers that his cast is already signed by the rest of the team:
  Kevin: Are you signing it?
  Dorothy: Correcting it. There is no K in victory. Oh yeah, and we'll just change this to 'Ms. Zbornak eats shiitake mushrooms.'
• GLOW (2017): After Ruth is injured, Bash signs her cast as "A Bash Howard production" and Sam first puts his initials "SS" but as Ruth mentions the Unfortunate Implications (it's commonly associated with the Nazi Schutzstaffel), he adds a small "F" for "Francis" between the letters.
• The Incredible Hulk (1977): In "The Beast Within", David's love interest of the week is a zoo veterinarian whose research on animal aggression he'd come to think might help with his "condition". Not recognizing him, she refers him to the work of "Dr. David Banner". Later, an altercation with the bad guys leaves her with a broken arm. At the hospital, David writes a suggestion as to how to continue her research on her cast. She reads it aloud after he leaves her room.
• Modern Family: In "Fizbo," Luke breaks his arm after slipping on some arts-and-crafts beads during his birthday party. Phil and Claire initially think he'll be upset, but it turns out he's excited because he wanted a cast for a birthday present. The episode ends with his sisters and cousins all eagerly taking turns signing the cast.
• Monk: "Mr. Monk's Favorite Show" has Natalie play an episode of The Cooper Clan for Adrian. A scene shows the actress Christine with a cast on her broken right arm and Monk is uninterested until the bit where Christine asks a boy called Jimmy to sign her cast but he laughs at her so she writes on her cast with her other hand. He recognizes that writing as the same as the one on Christine's mirror and the letters of threats, making him believe that Christine faked the threats to set Timlinson up.
• In episode 23 of The Secret Life Of My Secretary, Gal Hee gets into a minor accident and hurts her arm, which later gets encased with a cast. Min Ik visits her at the hospital, confesses his feelings for her, then draws a tiny heart on her cast.
  Min Ik: People do this when they injure their arm.
• Saturday Night Live: The Digital Short "I Broke My Arm" uses this trope for Black Comedy. Emma Stone plays a high school girl who breaks her arm after slipping on some spilled grape jelly. At first she's excited because everyone will get to sign her cast, and she leads a musical number about it...only to slip on the same patch of jelly again and break her other arm. Things just get worse from there as she repeatedly injures herself, and by the end, she's completely immobile and has to use a text-to-speech program to sing.
• True Beauty (2020): When Seojun gets in a car accident along with Suho and his right arm ends up in a cast, there's a bunch of writings on his cast. Jugyeong decides to add one as well, writing, "Tiger energy boost. Roar!" in reference to her "Roar!", which became a thing between them.

Music Videos

• In the Korean girl group NewJeans "Ditto" mv (side A), Ban Heesoo (the fandom representative) has her arm in a cast for some reason and the mv includes a scene where the members write things in English and Korean, with Minji drawing a heart with hot pink nail polish.

Theatre

• In the musical Dear Evan Hansen, two lonely high-school students, Evan and Connor, cross paths after Evan broke his arm falling from a tree. Connor offers to sign Evan's cast "so we can both pretend we have a friend." The poster even has the sentence, "#youwillbefound" on Evan's cast.

Toys

• A plaster cast in the (then-modern) accessory set for American Girl, the Cast and Crutches Set, has doodles on the yellow plaster that include various random names. A later set, the Feel Better Kit, has the doodles as stickers that can be applied to it and the included arm cast.
• LEGO Minifigures: The Clumsy Guy from Series 15 has several signatures and doodles printed on his foot cast.

Webcomics

• Awful Hospital: A minor character called Kyle is a disembodied lower leg bone with a cast. His "face" is a doodle on the cast, and there are other scrawlings and doodles around it.

Web Original

• The blog Ask A Manager once got a letter about someone who broke their arm and invited their coworkers to sign it. One person drew genitalia and wrote profanities on it. The manager of that person refused to take it seriously or do something about it. The employee with the cast tried to cover the offensive doodles but it did not work and everyone saw it.

Western Animation

• Phineas and Ferb: Doofenshmirtz breaks his leg and all fellow evil scientists visit him and write their name on his cast. He even reserved a place for Perry by drawing a circle with "Save for Perry" on it but by doing so removed the space for anyone to sign.
• The Raccoons: In "Black Belt Bentley!", after Bentley accidentally breaks Bert's arm practicing his karate moves, Bert gets various signatures and doodles from his friends on his cast. Bert wants Bentley to sign it as well, but Bentley is too ashamed to even look at it and runs off.
• Rated "A" for Awesome: In "My Brother the Car", Les breaks his arm trying to impress his crush Holly, and has to have it in a cast. Local bully Chet proceeds to write the word "loser" on the cast.
• The Simpsons:
  • In "Bart of Darkness", Bart breaks his leg and tries to get his friends to sign his cast, but they're too busy playing in the Simpsons' new pool to care, let alone notice. He catches Milhouse attempting to sneak past him and implores him to sign his name, but he ends up writing "Milpool" (with the "L" written very sloppily) before rushing off.
  • In "Diggs", Bart visits Diggs in the hospital after he breaks his arm while attempting to fly like a falcon. Since he has no friends, Diggs signed his cast with the names of fictional characters he wishes were his friends, including Phineas Fogg, Major T. J. "King" Kong, the TARDIS and Dalek #7.
  • In "The Last Traction Hero", Homer ends up in a torso cast and Bart signs it, but on Homer's stomach so he can't see what it says. When Homer demands to know what he wrote, Bart says it starts with an "f" and ends with a "ck", prompting Homer to try (and fail) to strangle him. Once we get a glimpse of the signature, it actually says "Father Good Luck".
• Star vs. the Forces of Evil: In "Monster Arm", Star not only signs the cast for Marco's broken arm but draws a lot of cutesy art on it◊ as well.

Real Life

• RM from BTS drew a heart on his right-hand cast because he couldn't do the Korean finger heart for Armys (the fandom name) with his wrapped hand.
• Ed Sheeran visited a 10-year fan whose illness prevented her from seeing him in concerts and performed a private gig for her. Ed also drew a heart on her broken leg cast and even signed it.
• After Frida Kahlo got into an accident when she was 18 years old which caused her to be bedridden, she started wearing a plaster corset for most of her life. She drew and painted on several casts things like the hammer and sickle symbol as she was a Marxist-Leninist, and various animals on her body corset with the help of a mirror to occupy her time.
• Lorde broke her arm before the Met Gala, and she had a cast on it. Taylor Swift, Kanye West, Lily Collins, and Ansel Elgort all signed her cast, and some celebrity went ahead and wrote "Met Balls" with a drawing of a dick.
• Britain's 51st Prime Minister Tony Blair signed the arm cast of a 7-year-old girl called Courtney Taylor in grace outside the Winter Gardens, Blackpool on May 2, 2006.

---