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{{trope}}
[[File:InkblotTest.jpg|frame|What do you see? And no, [[Watchmen (
{{quote|''"He said pepul see things in the ink. I said show me where. He said think. I told him I think a inkblot but that wasnt rite eather. He said what does it remind you—pretend something. I closd my eyes for a long time to pretend. I told him I pretned a fowntan pen with ink leeking all over a table cloth."''|'''Charlie Gordon''', ''[[
Whenever someone in fiction gives or receives a Rorschach test, the one where the patient looks at a blot of ink and says what he sees, the test is misrepresented. Instead of finding a reason for the patient to see something, the psychiatrist focuses more on ''what'' the patient sees. If the patient sees a butterfly, he's innocent, if he sees a corpse, he's guilty. Also, obsessed characters are always shown to see the same thing, no matter what the blot looks like.
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== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* A Rorschach test featured prominently in ''[[
* An antagonistic duelist in ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!
== [[Comic Books]] ==
* Used, appropriately, with the character Rorschach in ''[[Watchmen (
** At least in the movie, once Rorschach breaks out of his cell and gets his <s> mask</s> face (which frequently shifts into inkblot patterns) back he asks the doctor: "What do you see?".
* In [[Grant Morrison]]'s graphic novel ''[[Arkham Asylum a Serious House
* In ''Kid Eternity'', Kid is on the receiving end of this by his [[Evil Counterpart]] Dr. Pathos after being interned in the mental hospital he works at. Dr. Pathos grows increasingly frustrated when it becomes clear that Kid is just going to keep saying he sees "a man being swallowed by a giant vagina."
* There was an issue of ''[[Legion of Super
== [[Comics]] ==
* In a ''[[
* Gary Larson did a ''[[
* A Gahan Wilson cartoon has the patient addressing a weird blobby shape-- "No, doctor, the resemblance is ''amazing!''"
* A cartoon in ''Reader's Digest'' had an insect interpreting a big splotch: "Windshield."
== [[Film]] ==
* Parodied in ''[[
{{quote| '''Rockhound''': Woman with big breasts... woman with medium breasts... oh, this is like you ''(points to psychiatrist, who is male)'', but with breasts.<br />
'''AJ Frost''': This is Harry giving me a hard time. This is Harry telling me it's not good enough. This is Harry telling me I can't marry his daughter. Thanks a lot, I appreciate it. }}
* Subverted in ''[[
{{quote| '''Newton Crosby, PhD''': Where? Holy shit!<br />
'''Johnny 5''': No shit. Where see shit? }}
* In ''[[
** This troper found it strange that somebody as smart as Batman would be dumb enough to actually mention that he sees bats in any painting, and wouldn't know he was looking at a Rorschach.
*** It is incredibly difficult to see the 'inkblot' as being something other than a bat.
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* In Robert Pirsig's novel ''Lila'', Phaedrus claims that the true purpose of the Rorschach test is to gauge the subject's imaginative ability, such that if the person says "I don't see anything," or "I see an inkblot," that's allegedly a potential sign of severe mental illness. It should be noted that there is no evidence to support this claim. At most, such responses would indicate a lack of creativity.
* Played dead straight in ''[[Alex Ride]]'', when Alex is being assessed for suitability as an [[If You're So Evil Eat This Kitten|assassin.]] Most applicants saw a man lying in a pool of blood. Alex saw a guy with a bookbag.
* In ''[[
** It's not that he couldn't see the resemblance of the inkblots to anything else, it's just that he misinterpreted the psychiatrist's question as meaning that he was supposed to find some sort of hidden picture. Makes the same point, though.
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== [[Real Life]] ==
* A very old joke involves a man being shown a set of inkblots, and interpreting them all as pictures of people having sex. When the tester announces that he's clearly obsessed with sex, he says, "Me? You're the one with the collection of dirty pictures."
** ''[[
** Parodied in [http://wondermark.com/395/ this] [[Wondermark]] strip.
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== Live Action TV ==
* One episode of ''[[
** Then again, it could just be a joke or an inside reference, as viewers at that time likely wouldn't be too familiar with the Rorschach test.
* The titular character in ''[[Sledge Hammer]]'' received one, where he identified each picture as some violent scene... except for the last, which he claims is, "A duck handcuffing a naked woman". The psychologist remarks, "Funny, I've never seen the duck."
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* On ''[[Empty Nest]]'' the Lothario Charley finds Carol's inkblots and asks why she has pictures of naked women, (before putting them in his pocket for later.)
* ''[[Stephen Colbert]]'' blames his therapist for giving him inkblots that all look like the same thing - either a butterfly in bondage, or a mushroom cloud. He sees the same things in the outlines of countries (except for Italy, which doesn't look like anything at all, and Canada, which is [[Shaped Like Itself]]).
* In one ''[[
** And during the abstract credits of ''[[
{{quote| '''Crow:''' Ah, it's a Rorschach test.<br />
'''Mike:''' I see a lot of spilled ink, congealing in random patterns.<br />
'''Servo:''' That means you're a sexual predator. }}
* Parodied and then some in ''[[
* ''[[The Drew Carey Show]]'': Drew sees a psychologist ("Bring out the inkblots but I can tell you right now, they're all gonna be vaginas.") who tells him that he has low self-esteem.
{{quote| I don't have any self-esteem issues...''[sees an inkblot]'' hey, where'd you get this picture of my mom making fun of me?}}
* Parodied in ''[[Spaced]]''; as part of his psychological evaluation to re-enter the Territorial Army, Mike is administered an inkblot test... and identifies everything (including a card that clearly represents two people having sex) as being related to war, killing, guts and / or guns. Except for the last one, which he associates with a butterfly, until the disapproving look he gets from the panel inspires him to amend it to "Butterfly with a ''bomb''!" Needless to say, this demonstration of psychological maladjustment makes him perfect material for the TA, and he is re-admitted.
* ''[[Big Wolf
{{quote| '''Merton:''' (Looking at the ink blot tests) Bat....bat....A lonely boy who failed to please his father at every turn...<br />
'''Giger:''' Oh, sorry, that one was upside down.<br />
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* In the adventure game ''[[Sam and Max Freelance Police|Sam and Max]]: Culture Shock'', Sam can get an inkblot test from Sybil Pandemik. Depending on the answers he gives, Sybil will diagnose him with an obsession with money, fame, violence, cars, or animals. This later forms part of a puzzle, where you have to get Sam diagnosed with the fictional psychosis Artificial Personality Disorder.
* [[Heavy Rain]] has Ethan see 4 blots. During each blot, you get to choose what image out of 3 option you choose. The first 3 are innocent, while the last one is all death related options.
* In the tutorial/character creation part of ''[[Fallout: New Vegas]]'', inkblots are one of the tests Doc Mitchell gives the player character in order to determine your tag skills, along with a word association test.
** [http://newvegasnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=36850 A humorous mod] to the game adds an additional, rather obvious answer to one of the ink blots. Once you see it, it can't be unseen...
* In ''[[Batman:
{{quote| '''Joker''': ''"Do you want me to look at the ink blots again? The first one is a kitten I had when I was a child, the second is, hmmm let's see... a dead elephant."''}}
* A variation occurs in one of the psych tests in [[Silent Hill: Shattered Memories]]. The player is given a selection of ink blots and asked to sort them into two piles: sexual images and non-sexual images. After this is done, the psychiatrist reveals that each image has a second meaning: {{spoiler|death.}}
== [[Web Comics]] ==
* ''[[Comicstrip/Perry Bible Fellowship|Perry Bible Fellowship]]'' has a [http://pbfcomics.com/?cid=PBF233-Psychoanalyst.jpg twisted take.]
* In ''[[
* Done for [[Sonic the Hedgehog|Dr. Eggman]] in [[Level 30 Psychiatry]]. All he sees is Sonic and friends being injured or a good evil scheme. For bonus points the [http://lvl30psy.thecomicseries.com/comics/pl/184268 title] and the rant refer to Watchmen.
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[[Shaped Like Itself|A symmetrical ink blot card, as designed by Rorschach]]?<br />
Yes, but what does that Ink Blot LOOK like?<br />
[[Exactly What It Says
== [[Western Animation]] ==
* Parodied in ''[[Drawn Together]]'', where a test of this kind is applied to Xandir. All the things he says he sees are homosexual innuendo, but all the "blots" of ink are also figurative representations of those [[Double Entendre|Double Entendres]].
* Parodied on the ''[[101 Dalmatians
* Used in ''[[Buzz Lightyear of Star Command]]'' several times: a villainous robot sees several types of explosives (including a fluffy bunny- holding a ticking bomb); his mildly sex-crazed brother sees various types of exotic dancers, including his only female teammate as an exotic dancer.
** In another episode, the titular character sees [[Big Bad]] Zurg in every ink blot, then at the end of the test the administrator of it holds up a picture of a teammate, leading to one of the best lines of the series:
{{quote| '''Buzz:''' That's Mira. She's happy. Cuz we got Zurg's pen.}}
* ''[[
** [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uijVczimX-w Dot's Test]
** [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KVO43rgi9o Yakko's Test]
** Later in the series, Dr. Scratchensniff again gives the test to Yakko, to whom every picture looks like "girls." ("Well, you're the one with all the sexy pictures!")
* Captain Black of ''[[
* This happens on ''[[The Simpsons (
* In the ''[[
* In an episode of ''[[Duckman]]'', the titular detective accidentally gets a Rorschach-like stain on his chest:
{{quote| "A picture of me and Vanna White frolicking naked with a tribe of pygmies!"<br />
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"..A drag queen on a Shetland pony licking a flaming banjo.."<br />
"..Me, a rabbi, and six drunken longshoreman rolling around on a rubber bed.." }}
* One episode of ''[[
* Parodied/[[Lampshade Hanging|Lampshaded]] on ''[[
{{quote| '''[[The Straight Man|Dib]]:''' What does identifying ink blotches have to do with determining our future careers?<br />
'''Ms. Bitters:''' Oh you poor, doomed child. }}
* In the pilot episode of ''[[
* An episode of ''[[Beavis and Butthead]]'' had the boys looking at some inkblots and constantly hinting that it looked like a guy masturbating. When shown a photo of a male singer holding a microphone in a suggestive manner, Butt-Head says "Uh...that's like, just a bunch of shapes."
* ''[[Re Boot]]'' Phong gives Bob one of these and asks him what he sees. Bob sees Dot with the haircut she used to have when they first met and she's smiling. Then Phong takes another look at it and says "Oh now I see."
* Used briefly in ''[[
* Used in an episode of ''[[Doug]]'' where Skeeter is given one after scoring very high on one of those Myers-Briggs type tests. He is given the option to skip ahead to college, but {{spoiler|chooses not to, because he doesn't fit in with the college crowd, who smoke and aren't fond of his air guitar.}}
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