Driving Test

A character has to get a driving license or get one renewed.

However, they have a difficult time with a picky driving tester who will not accept any errors and makes the character nervous. As a result, the character fails the test and is despondent. With a pep talk and some tips from friends, the character gets the gumption to retake the test.

Often, during the test, a danger occurs that forces the character to make emergency maneuvers to escape the danger. The character is successful and the Tester is impressed enough to give bonus points in the evaluation for successfully dealing with a dangerous situation which means the driving test was completed successfully.

Examples of Driving Test include:

Anime & Manga

• Parodied in Dragon Ball Z, where Goku and Piccolo try to get licenses. Their competitive personalities result in much mayhem.
• Subverted in the You're Under Arrest manga. Natsumi (an utterly reckless driver) already has a motorcycle license, but not a car license. Upon deciding to obtain one she's eventually required to take a driving test. Her driving is so utterly reckless that the tester passes out almost immediately and doesn't wake up until Natsumi parks back in the lot. She passed.

Comic Books

• The Marvel Adventures version of Spider-Man has to take a driving test in one issue. He does very well - the Spider Sense apparently does wonders on the road - until a villain attacks, and he has to "panic" to get away so he can put on his suit and fight. Naturally, he fails. In a mild subversion, he doesn't retake and doesn't actually mind all that much (probably because he lives in New York City).

Film

• Clueless.
• The just horrible 80's movie License to Drive in which one of the Coreys (Haim or Feldman) has to get his driver's license in order to get into Heather Graham's pants. Hilarity Ensues. Not really.
• Happy-Go-Lucky features plenty of driving lessons, but they never get to the test part for... plot-related reasons.

Literature

• Terry Pratchett's Pyramids showed the Assassins' Guild School final exam - here "driving" is replaced with "killing someone for money and getting away with it".
  • Though in a driving test it isn't rumoured to be an immediate pass to kill the examiner. If you try and fail, there will be a loss of privileges. Breathing to start with.
  • Also notable because the protagonist decides to fail, shoots his crossbow wildly, and hits the target. He passes but the examiner criticises the "modern flashy techniques".

Live Action TV

• Subverted in the Married... with Children episode "Driving Mr. Boondy". Al has to take a driving test and discovers that his son, Bud, will be administering the test. Al passes by threatening Bud.
  • Same episode, airhead daughter Kelly has no problem passing her test.
• Mama's Family, in the episode "Mama Learns to Drive".
• Drake and Josh
• Spoofed in Malcolm in the Middle when Reese, annoyed that his driving instructor did not give him any time to take his driving test, usurps the driving seat from the other girl so he could at least drive back to the DMV. Suddenly, a lady accidentally bumps into the car. Reese, panicking (thinking he messed up), drives off and eventually gets involved in a low speed chase with several police cars. You have to watch the whole episode just to know how hilarious it is.
  • Not to mention that the chase ends when Reese returns to the driving school and completes the course PERFECTLY. He even parallel parks in his time behind the wheel, prompting a cop watching the chase at Malcolm's home to remark "That's impressive!"
• Played painfully straight in Hannah Montana where Miley messes up her test and uses her secret identity to retake it. Naturally she gets caught, spends a night in the slammer and gets humiliated by Robbie Ray to drive the point home.
• Part of the pilot episode plot of Shit My Dad Says.
• The Big Bang Theory features an episode where Sheldon is forced to get his license because Leonard can't drive him around and no one else will. He manages to pass the written test by annoying the DMV clerk past the point of endurance and then attempts to practice via a realistic simulator rigged up by Howard. It does not go well. He eventually gets his learner's permit (offscreen) by the next season.
• Partially inverted in the episode "Wheelers and Dealers" of Mash. Potter is send to traffic school, conducted by Rizzo. Rizzo wants to pass Potter without Potter having to do anything, but Potter wants to play it by the book. After initially failing, he just passes the written test, but still needs to do a driving test. Again, Rizzo wants to pass Potter, but Potter insists doing the test. He gets an accident, but Rizzo passes Potter, because of how well he steered around the danger.

Western Animation

• Doug (with his sister Judy)
• Sabrina the Animated Series (one of the aunts)
  • which humorously resulted in everyone getting a license. Even the Cat (Salem)
• Kim Possible (only without danger in the re-test, but there is some in the mission involving the car she used in the re-test)
• Subverted often in SpongeBob SquarePants, where Spongebob tries (and fails) to get his Boat Driving License every few episodes.
  • He always fails because he panics and smashes the gas pedal down hard, ramming the boat into a brick wall at top speed. Every. Single. Time.
• Parodied in Drawn Together. When Ling-Ling tries to get his license, his instructor pulls out a huge protective gear strong enough to protect a Formula 1 driver. Ling-Ling then turns the key, shifts to drive... and a big mountain of cars, airplanes, motorbikes, trains and ships suddenly lands on the car. This is later explained by Wooldoor Sockbat, claiming those who have Asian eyes see danger everywhere and can't speak English (which is why Ling-Ling speaks Japanese-sounding gibberish).
• The Pixar short Lifted replaces "driving" with "Alien Abduction".
• One episode of Rocko's Modern Life has Rocko re-taking his driving test after getting his license revoked. Throughout the episode, he's constantly warned about taking his test with "the fat guy". Rocko ends up with a fairly rotund elephant who gives him his driving test without any car. Rocko passes, and then finds out that wasn't even the fat guy.
• The Simpsons contributes two: Once when Homer takes his limo driver's test and a second when Otto needs to get his license. Otto has trouble initially.

"Alcohol increases your ability to drive..." Pages through book to answers. "FALSE!?!"

• In Megas XLR Coop has to endure the trials of the DMV after his giant, bipedal war machine from the future gets towed. You did not misread that.
• In Ben 10: Ultimate Alien, Gwen takes her driving test, but who cares? Ben's getting a video game made about him!!