Secret Tests of Character in comic books.
- American Born Chinese: Occurs several times, most notably with the ungrateful vagrants treated by Wong Lai-Tsao, and Chin-Kee's embarrassing visits to Danny.
- In the Free Comic Book Day issue of The All-New, All-Different Avengers, the Sam Wilson Captain America has Nova, Ultimate Spider-Man and Ms. Marvel go in and stop whoever broke into the bank, encountering Radioactive Man inside. When the other Avengers enter soon after, Radioactive Man's escaped. However, Miles points out that they rescued someone who would have died if they hadn't. Sam's quite proud and welcomes the trio into the team, though Iron Man has to tell Nova that, just because they're "the Avengers", doesn't mean they have to avenge any deaths.
- The Back to the Future story "When Marty Met Emmett" establishes that Marty escaping from a booby trap in Doc's garage is a secret test of character from Doc, as Doc was seeking an assistant who was clever enough to escape the trap.
- Doctor Strange started out as a Jerkass surgeon whose hands were crippled in a drunk driving accident, ending his career. He went to the eccentric Ancient One after hearing rumors that the man could work miracles, but the old sorcerer refused to cure him because of Strange's selfish heart. However, he did offer to teach him magic instead, which Strange refused. Confined in the Ancient One's retreat because of a snowstorm, Strange witnessed Baron Mordo, one of the sorcerer's trusted disciples, plotting against him. He tried to warn the master but was magically silenced. He realized Mordo could not be stopped except by magic, so he asked the Ancient One to teach him as well — whereupon the old master revealed he had known about Mordo's treachery for some time and merely wanted to see if he could reach "the real Doctor Strange." He then made the offer openly, which Strange accepted.
- The Flash: When Golden Age super-speedster Max Mercury was put in charge of teaching Impulse (Bart Allen) some sense, he had his work cut out for him; Impulse had been raised in a consequence-free virtual reality video-game, and as such tended to act without thinking. After multiple attempts to make him slow down and consider his actions failed, Max took him camping, claiming that some relaxing time in the woods might calm him down. Then Max pretended to get his foot caught and caused a rock-slide, calling Impulse for help. Naturally, Impulse rushed to his aid, smashing the falling boulders before they could get to Max. But when asked why he went for the rocks instead of simply freeing Max and taking him to safety, the only reason Bart could come up with is "the rocks are worth more points". Max realizes he still has a lot of work to do.
- Guardians of the Galaxy: In Vol 1, Mainframe gives the team individual challenges. Aleta is given a test of forgiveness towards Stakar. She refuses. Nikki's is a test of mercy. Her Fantastic Racism leads her to try and murder her enemy. Charlie-27's is for cunning, but he resorts to simple brawn. Martinex's is of courage, Yondu's honor and Starhawk's faith, and they win, leaving Major Victory as the last one standing, in a (metaphorical) test of his very soul, and whether he's worthy to wield Captain America's shield. He wins.
- In Insufferable, Crimefighter Nocturnas goes to police ally Anne Rainwood to tell her someone is making it look like his late wife is alive. This includes a vase of her ashes exploding and he wants her to run a DNA test to see if they're really hers. Rainwood contacts Nocturnas later to say the tests came back positive. She says she's sorry and Nocturnas says so is he...because he'd hoped Rainwood's first reaction would be to tell him there's no way you can get DNA off of cremated remains. The fact she played along with this obvious bluff proves to him she's in league with whoever is behind this.
- Judge Dredd
- When Dredd was overseeing Giant's final exam, Giant messed up but managed to persuade Dredd to give him a second chance on a just-reported kidnapping. Later on, they caught a pair of perps and Dredd was about to execute them, when Giant ordered him to stop, as the penalty for their crime was imprisonment, not death. Dredd threatened to fail Giant if he went ahead with this, but Giant insisted — at which point Dredd congratulated him on passing the most important part of the exam, which is that a judge must be devoted to the law above even his own career. Giant goes on to show he's understood by refusing to attend the celebration party his family had planned- he's a judge now.
- Giant's son employs the exact same trick - acknowledged in-universe - on his older friend Guthrie. Gutrhie has been crippled and wishes for nothing more than an euthanasia, so Giant goes down hard on a creep until Guthrie swears to hunt him down himself. Guthrie reminds Giant that more than anything else, they're Judges, and put their duty over personal pleasure and satisfaction. Giant is all too glad that Guthrie remembered this, and backs down.
- Paperinik New Adventures: This is the plot of a Pikappa issue. Rookie Guardians (main character Paperinik included) are sent to a spaceship and told that they'll have to pass some tests. During one such test, a series of accidents happen, which result in the examiner being killed and the rookies being left in a stranded ship and attacked by robotic aliens. In reality, the examiner simulated his own death, and the whole thing is a secret test to see how the rookies handle themselves in stressful situations. Paperinik passes the test by remaining calm and trying to defuse the in-fighting... and then he breaks it, by discovering that the examiner is still alive and controlling the aliens, hacking the control system, and shutting down the aliens. The examiner is very satisfied.
- Robin (1993): On the day of his sixteenth birthday, Tim Drake/Robin III received a message from the future warning him that one of the members of the Batfamily had turned into a Knight Templar and giving him the task to prevent it, driving Tim to isolated paranoia for several weeks. Then it turned out it was all a test orchestrated by Batman, who wanted Tim to be prepared and ready for such an eventuality. Tim was not amused and quit being Robin, until he came to terms with Batman's actions.
- Rare villainous example: In one of the Sin City short stories, Schlubb and Klump are sent to dispose of what they think is a body rolled up in a carpet (it has a pair of boots sticking out of one end) and are told not to look inside. It actually turns out to be a test of whether they can follow orders, and the carpet blows up when they try to steal the boots. They are bad at being loyal henchmen.
- Disney Ducks Comic Universe: In the Carl Barks story "Some Heir Over the Rainbow", Scrooge McDuck wants to test his relatives to know who deserves to inherit his fortune. Believing the best way to do it was giving them money without them knowing it came from him, Scrooge picked three pots and placed each one of them with a thousand dollars. He then hid the pots at the ends of three rainbows and set his relatives to finding them. Huey, Dewey and Louie found the first one, Gladstone Gander found the second one, and Donald Duck found the third one. A few days later, Scrooge called his relatives to know how they used the money. Donald spent it as the down payment of a new car and was now one thousand dollars in debt, prompting Scrooge to disqualify him as heir. Gladstone, not seeing any immediate use for his thousand dollars, hid the money somewhere. While Scrooge was disappointed Gladstone hasn't tried to invest the money, the fact Gladstone still had it saved him from disqualification. When Huey, Dewey and Louie told him they gave the money to finance a search for a buried treasure, Scrooge believed they had been conned out of the money and decided to name Gladstone his sole heir, despite considering this an awful injustice to the world. However, it turns out the man they gave the money did find a treasure and the boys got a good share of it. Scrooge then named them his heirs.
- Sonic the Comic: One story had Tails meet up with an anthropomorphic unicorn who grants him a wish for saving him from the Badniks. True to his nature, Tails's wish is for Mobius to be free from Robotnik's rule. The Unicorn then takes Tails to a room looking down on Robotnik as he drives along in a parade. Tails is given a gun and told that if he shoots Robotnik Mobius will be free. Being who he is Tails throws the gun down and yells that it's wrong. The unicorn tells Tails that he made the right choice, and as long as he follows his good nature, one day, his wish will come true.
- In one issue of the Star Trek: The Next Generation comics, the tyrant Zed puts Picard in a situation where the only way to save his crew is to kill Zed, who's behind a force field and armed. This is partly a test of Picard's courage, which he passes by charging Zed, having correctly guessed that the force field is one-way. Picard now has Zed's gun, but this too is a test, as it isn't charged. Zed wants to prove that Picard is willing to kill and thus no better than he. A debatable point, but Picard isn't fooled — and he uses the "useless" weapon to set up a test of his own.
- Superman:
- In their first story, the Legion of Super-Heroes gave a test to Superboy to see if he was fit. He failed all three challenges they put to him because he was otherwise occupied dealing with another, apparently genuine threat, but when he did not make excuses, they explained that their history clearly showed his powers were strong enough; they had actually tested his character by sabotaging the trials and seeing if he would accept their ruling or mention his real reasons to justify his failure.Superboy: "But— But I don't understand! I've been rejected..."
Saturn Girl: "No, you're a member, Superboy! We gave you a bad time only as your initiation! We deliberately decoyed you elsewhere during each contest![...]"
Cosmic Boy: "It was only your initiation, and it proved you're a super-good sport, taking it all with a smile!" - Subverted in Action Comics #258. Superman wanted to find out if Supergirl could protect her secret identity. So he sent Krypto the Superdog to trick her into revealing her identity, and then he exiled her in space for a week. Then he tried to prove that Linda Lee had superpowers using his Clark Kent identity. When she admitted that she was Superman's cousin without even attempting to cover it up, he thought she had failed...until she said she had figured out that he was Superman.
- In Supergirl vol. 5 #23, Kara opens a soundproofed, lead-lined gift that mysteriously appeared in her apartment, which was a test from Batman who calls her and admonishes her for opening it.
- In Krypton No More, Supergirl refuses to help her cousin when he fights Protector, saying "It's [not my] fight!". Her real reason to sit it out was trying to see if Superman could still function after having a breakdown.
- Starfire's Revenge: As giving her minion Derek his payment, crimelord Starfire casually asks him what he will spend his wad of cash on. If he answers something harmless, she will let him go. If he answers something like "women and drinks", she will deem him a liability to be killed. Unfortunately for him, Derek is a chronic seducer and bon vivant, so he answers "girls and alcohol" and gets shot.
- In Death & the Family, the spirits of the McDougal Clan tell Silver Banshee her curse (being turned into an ageless banshee and forced to wander the Earth until finding her clan's seven hidden heirlooms) was really a test to find out if she has what it takes to be one of her clan's leaders.McDougal:' For generations, the spirits of the McDougal Clan have hidden these artifacts all over the world and sent prospective clan leaders in search of them. Gave them powers so they could accomplish that task. What we did to ye wasn' a curse, Siobhan. It was a test. A test you failed time and again.
- In The Day the Cheering Stopped, Superman is given a legendary weapon which can turn him into a god. However, Superman does not want to lose his humanity, so he casts the Sword back into space. Then he is told he has made the right choice, and he has actually proved he is the Sword's rightful bearer.Storyteller: "So now, rather than a sword, a sword's hilt tumbles among the stars— untouched by any living thing... until the one who earned it, by not using it, chooses to retrieve it— or join it on its flight to eternity!"
- DC Retroactive Superman: In "The 80s" issue, an entity who looks like Destiny of the Endless appears before Superman to show him visions of a horrible future where his loved ones die, heroes get killed or become evil or twisted, thousands get killed... and all of it will happen unless Superman lets a race of alien giants turn humanity into their mind-controlled slaves. No matter what Destiny shows to him, though, Superman refuses to stop fighting. Pleased, "Destiny" vanishes and transforms into the Monitor's agent, Harbinger, who is looking for heroes who are powerful and strong-willed enough to fight the Anti-Monitor and stop the Crisis on Infinite Earths.
- In Doomsday Clock, Dr. Manhattan foresees Superman attacking him and sets out to Make Wrong What Once Went Right across the DC Rebirth timeline Because Destiny Says So. Through Butterfly of Doom he stops the Justice Society of America from ever forming, kills Superman's adoptive parents, corrupts Superman's biological father, puts Superwoman in a coma, and more. After telling Superman what he's done, Supes charges toward him... to save him from a sneak attack. After being told that he's free to make his own destiny and Take a Third Option, Manhattan becomes so inspired by Superman's relentless optimism that he undoes all the damage to both their universes and cements his status as The Anti-Nihilist.
- The K-Metal from Krypton: Mining entepreneur Craig Matthews left the "Hidden Gold" picture as inheritance to his nephew John Manners without telling anything about the map hidden underneath the painting because he figured that if John was smart enough to figure it out, he deserved the inheritance.
- In Superman (Phillip Kennedy Johnson), Superman is seeking the power of the old god Olgrun in the depths of Warworld. To his surprise, the Fire of Olgrun turns out to manifest as a young girl who says he needs to pass a series of tests, the first one being a riddle she poses. The second test is when the statue of Olgrun comes to life and, after a brief fight with the depowered Superman, says he's found him unworthy and will destroy the Fire to prevent him gaining it. Superman instinctively moves to protect the girl, even though, in his depowered state, he's risking his own life to do so. This, of course, is the real test.
- In their first story, the Legion of Super-Heroes gave a test to Superboy to see if he was fit. He failed all three challenges they put to him because he was otherwise occupied dealing with another, apparently genuine threat, but when he did not make excuses, they explained that their history clearly showed his powers were strong enough; they had actually tested his character by sabotaging the trials and seeing if he would accept their ruling or mention his real reasons to justify his failure.
- Suicide Squad: The entire first issue of the 2011 relaunch is a giant secret test of character.
- The Transformers (Marvel): In a story, Optimus Prime, having heard about the trouble that happened when he was in limbo, decides to fake his death to force the other Autobots to learn to operate without him while still being able to jump in if things get out of hand. Unfortunately, due to the actions of the Predacons, Optimus (and Megatron) end up on Cybertron, forcing Optimus' team to operate without him for real.
- In the "Road to Trial of the Amazons" back-up in Wonder Woman (Infinite Frontier), three women are applying to join the Amazons of Bana-Mighdall. They are told they have to fight to the death for the honour and given a selection of weapons. Two of them grab guns, the third takes a staff and explains she wants to become an Amazon, but she won't kill another woman to do it. This is, of course, the right answer.
- X-Wing Rogue Squadron: During The Making of Baron Fel, Director of Imperial Intelligence Ysanne Isard gives the Ace Pilot a Forceful Kiss followed by a We Can Rule Together. He adamantly rejects both
◊, and she smiles and said that she'd told the Emperor that he was utterly loyal and incorruptible. Whether this was a test, as she claimed, or a bit of Xanatos Speed Chess depends on who you ask. - Usagi Yojimbo: A flashback story revolves around Katsuichi giving a young Usagi seeds to start his own garden to teach him self-reliance. However, the seeds fail to grow despite the care Usagi gives them. With a day to go before Katsuichi wants to see the results, Usagi sneaks out during the night to swipe some produce from the villagers' gardens. Realizing how hard the villagers worked to raise their vegetables, Usagi returns to the hut to confess what he was going to do and that he'll leave. Katsuichi reveals that he had boiled the seeds before giving them to Usagi (in short, they were never going to grow) and that it was all really a test of Usagi's character.
