Princess Anna of Arendelle, the picture of sophisticated grace.
If you have a character who is fast asleep, what would be a comical way to display this? Why don't we have the character trickle down saliva from their mouth, as in drooling like a little baby?
This is the trope where a character drools while sleeping in a noticeable display of comedy. In some cases, drooling can be used to indicate innocence, since, commonly, small children tend to drool while they're asleep. When adults do this, it's supposed to portray them as inelegant and crude, especially with females. Then again, when women do it, it can be considered as cute while male droolers are considered to be very childish.
This can be justified by the fact they are a Heavy Sleeper. There's an indication that whenever a character drools at sleep, it shows that the sleeper is mentally dumb, and/or socially awkward (rarely Book Dumb). This could also happen if they're dreaming about food. It's often accompanied by loud, obnoxious snoring. Many people have done this at some point in their lives. Compare Snoring Beauty, which is when a traditionally beautiful and dignified woman or girl snores loudly, and may very well do this on top of it.
Examples:
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Advertising
- An advert for Pro Plus stimulant shows a woman drooling while asleep.
Anime & Manga
- The Daichis - Earth's Defense Family: In Episode 1, in the scene after they are told about defending the earth, the first thing that shows up is Dai napping and drooling on the kitchen table. One line of drool is on the right side of his mouth, and the other two are on the left side of his mouth.
- In Four Knights of the Apocalypse, an ill-timed Power-Strain Blackout causes Gawain to fall asleep on the battlefield. Cut to her snoring on the cobblestones, drooling with her mouth open, mumbling about pudding.
- JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: In JoJolion, during the events of the Milagro Man encounter, Norisuke catches Joshu drooling all over the sofa while he's sleeping.
- K-On!: Yui falls asleep during the opening ceremony, and ends up drooling on Akira's suit.
- The Quintessential Quintuplets:
- Nino sports one in Chapter 14, when Fuutarou enters her room while she's still asleep to ask her to give him back his notebook.
- In Chapter 86, all five sisters fall asleep together in the bus, and Yotsuba is the only one who's drooling.
- SPY×FAMILY: When Anya is shown sleeping, she has small drooling from sleep.
- In Sword Art Online, Asuna catches Kirito napping and reads him the riot act, but he convinces her to take a break and she takes a nap. When she wakes up, she's drooling and has grass stuck to her face.
Comic Books
- Incandescence is shown drooling in her sleep at the beginning and end of the Zine Heist short “A Day in the Life.”
Comic Strips
- Garfield does this every so often, with some of the most notable instances being in the title card of The April 01, 2001 strip, at one point while asleep in the July 06, 2003 strip, and as part of "Garfield Napping", as he likes to call it, in the January 03, 2021 strip.
- Liō: The 2017 Christmas strip shows Lio and Ishmael sleeping under the Christmas tree, with literal rivers of drool flowing from their mouths; the drool merges and spells out the words "Merry Christmas".
- Red and Rover: In the February 25, 2001 strip, Rover is licking Red’s face incessantly, until Red finally tells him to stop, and that his face is plenty wet — in reality, Red has fallen asleep in class, having only dreamt of Rover licking him, and his face is actually wet from lying in a puddle of his own drool.
Fan Works
- In My Dream Is Yours, Olympia finds some drool on her shoulder when she wakes up from her impromptu nap at the park with Otis. She's not sure if it's her own drool or if it was Otis's, with his head on her shoulder.
- One chapter in Requiem for a Loud says that Lincoln had drooled all over his pillow the night before, and that this was a "clear sign of deep, rejuvenating sleep".
Films — Animated
- 101 Dalmatians II: Patch's London Adventure: One of the reasons why Patch can't sleep one night is because one of the other 98 puppies sleeping in a loft right above him has a long strand of drool hanging from his/her mouth, and it eventually falls and splatters right on top of him.
- BoBoiBoy: The Movie: The night after he stops the Hot Pursuit and thinks of how to make it up to his friends for forgetting their camping trip, BoBoiBoy lies sprawled on his bed, a puddle of drool at the corner of his mouth as his snoring blows a bubble from his nose.
- Everyone's Hero: A sleeping Yankee Irving drools on Screwie, the sentient baseball, much to the latter's chagrin and disgust.
Screwie: Hey, kid! Wake up! You're turning me into a spitball!
- Frozen:
- Frozen: After a lengthy tracking shot through Arendelle of dignitaries arriving for Elsa's official coronation as Queen, two of them are heard talking about how beautiful the Queen and her sister, Princess Anna, likely are. The scene then smash-cuts to Anna still fast asleep in bed, sporting a terrible case of bedhead (with some of her hair in her mouth) and a visible trace of drool.
- The sequel continues this tradition with Anna being shown drooling in her sleep shortly before the "Into the Unknown" number, and even being shown to have been a sleep-drooler as a child in the opening flashback where her mother is singing her to sleep and putting her to bed.
- In The Lorax (2012), during the scene where all the animals invade the Once-ler's cottage, one of the Bar-Ba-Loots is sleeping on the light fixture right above the Once-ler, and drops of its drool fall right on his face.
Films — Live-Action
- Dutch: Doyle naps in the back of the car using a prostitute's breasts (wearing low cut dress) as a pillow. She noticeably wipes moisture off her chest after he wakes up.
- In Ferris Bueller's Day Off, at least one student sleeping in Ben Stein's class has a visible trail of drool on his desk.
- Firehouse Dog: At the beginning of the movie, Shane falls asleep before class due to staying up all night playing video games, drooling while his friends scramble to cram for their upcoming pop quiz.
- Galaxy Quest: There is saliva drooling out of Jason's mouth when he first wakes up on the ship.
Literature
- Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The first book, The Lightning Thief, brings up this trope as a way to establish Annabeth and Percy's Friendly Enemies to Vitriolic Best Buds relationship. Annabeth is tending Percy after his battle with the Minotaur at the start of the story. He expects her to compliment him; instead, she says, "You drool in your sleep."
- Prophecy Approved Companion: From the first chapter:
She wrenched open his front door and immediately saw him. The shining Hero of the known world. The one she had trained her entire life to walk beside. Her destiny.
Who was currently fast asleep half off his bed, drool forming a small puddle on the ground.
Live-Action TV
- Babylon 5: One Mimbari ritual involves watching your loved one sleep, leading to a comment from Sheridan about how romantic it is to be staring at someone drooling on their pillow.
- Mentioned, though not shown, in an episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Buffy: Did anyone notice that I was asleep?
Willow: Very discreet, minimal drool. - In the Clarissa Explains It All episode "No TV", Janet bans the whole Darling family from watching TV for a week because Clarissa and Ferguson have been fighting over the remote too much. During one Boredom Montage showing the ways each family member is coping, Ferguson is asleep at the kitchen table, and his drool forms the perfect shape of a whale on a paper napkin.
- Rizzoli & Isles: Mentioned in "The Best Laid Plans", when Maura claims that Jane has never stayed awake long enough to see a full episode of Downton Abbey.
Jane: It's called "meditating". It's how I focus. You've never respected that.Maura: The puddle of drool makes it hard.
- In the K-drama Strong Woman Do Bong-soon, a flashback shows her first meeting with her deep crush, In Guk Doo: Bong Soon is asleep in class with her head on her arm when Guk Doo walks in as a new transfer. She stares at him in awe, completely smitten, as he takes the remaining empty seat next to him, only for him to awkwardly point out the trickle of drool on the side of her face, causing the rest of the class to laugh. This sets up years of Bong Soon pining (apparently) one-sidedly for Guk Doo while he treats her like a sister.
- Young Sheldon: In "Demons, Sunday School, and Prime Numbers", Georgie wakes Sheldon up from his Binary Code dream and tells him he's drooling all over his books.
Video Games
- In Bear & Breakfast, Hank drools while sleeping on the kitchen table in the title screen.
- Danganronpa 2: Goodbye Despair: One of Chiaki’s sprites has her sleeping as a long line of drool falls out of her mouth while a snot bubble comes out of her nose. It helps establish her as a Genius Ditz.
- Henry Stickmin Series: One of the police officers in Escaping the Prisonnote is shown sleeping on the job and drooling all over his desk.
- In I Was a Teenage Exocolonist, Nomi drools in their sleep in their nine-heart event after zonking out while working on their holonovel.
- In Pokémon Sleep, Caterpie is sometimes seen using String Shot in its sleep, making it look like it's drooling.
- Shantae and the Seven Sirens: The owner of the Droll-Stained Doll in Armor Town explains the drool as due to her being a heavy sleeper.
- Splatoon 2: During the Octo Expansion, Pearl has a picture of Marina drooling while sleeping, which she gladly uses to embarrass her.
- Zenless Zone Zero: At the end of Burnice's Character Demo, while she's asleep at the bar's counter, Lucy ends up getting some on her when she and Caesar try to carry her home.
Western Animation
- In the Avatar: The Last Airbender episode "The Puppetmaster", Sokka is complaining that the inn is creepy and he doesn't know if he'll be able to sleep there. Cut to Sokka, sound asleep, with an impressive amount of drool soaking the pillow next to his mouth.
- Danny Phantom: In "Teacher of the Year", Danny ends up staying up all night playing an online video game, but ultimately decides to man out the inevitable sleepy day at school, saying, "What's the worst that could happen?" Cut to him at his desk, snoring away and drooling all over his unfinished test.
Mr. Lancer: (holding up Danny's drool-soaked paper) Ah, teaching. Always rewarding.
- Family Guy: In "Peter's Def Jam", when Peter and the guys start their own podcast, Cleveland tells a very long story about Velcro shoes, resulting in the others eventually dozing off; Peter and Joe are shown drooling.
- Hazbin Hotel: In the pilot, Katie Killjoy falls asleep and drools during Charlie's announcement for the hotel.
- Kaeloo: This happens when any character, even one who is considered "elegant", falls asleep.
- The Loud House:
- In "Space Invader", where Lynn ends up sleeping in Lincoln's room, she has drool dangling from her lower lip, and it flaps in the breeze with every exhale.
- In "Lock 'n' Loud", drool spills out of Lincoln's mouth when he and Clyde fall asleep listening to the police scanner.
- Monkie Kid: In "The Winning Side", on Pigsy and Tang’s side of the van, Tang is shown asleep in the passenger seat while drooling. After a cut to a scene of MK, Mei, and Sandy, Tang has filled his entire scarf with drool.
- My Life as a Teenage Robot: While waiting for Sheldon and Brad to finish removing Jenny’s parts in the episode "Victim of Fashion", Tuck eventually dozes off and drools on the floor in front of him (from the roof of his mouth as opposed to his lower lip or the side of his mouth, like most people, curiously).
- Nate Is Late: In "The Vampires", after Harmony puts the main duo to sleep with her hypnosis powers, Nate is shown drooling from the side of his mouth. His drool continues to dangle from his mouth even as he's being carried away by Harmony in her bat form.
- The Simpsons:
- Homer Simpson is pretty much the reigning champion of comical droolers in this show.
- In the episode "Cape Feare", Sideshow Bob breaks into their house boat and the family is tied up while they're all in bed asleep and brought to the living room. Lisa looks at Homer drooling.
Lisa: Oh, no! Dad's been drugged!Marge: No, he hasn't.
- In "One Fish, Two Fish, Blowfish, Blue Fish", Homer thinks he has eaten some poisonous blowfish and has 24 hours to live. He stays up that night listening to The Bible on tape read by Larry King. Marge finds him the next morning and starts to weep — but then realizes: "His drool! It's still warm! Oh, Homie!"
- In "Treehouse of Horror II", Homer's brain is placed in a robot and the robot proceeds to sleep and drool oil.
- The DVD menu for the movie shows Homer drooling while sleeping on top of the words of the menu selection.
- In the episode "Cape Feare", Sideshow Bob breaks into their house boat and the family is tied up while they're all in bed asleep and brought to the living room. Lisa looks at Homer drooling.
- Martin Prince, Jr. drools in his sleep three times in the same episode, that episode being "Bart on the Road" – once while napping in the car at the beginning of the boys' road trip, then again during the Andy Williams concert, and then again when he, Nelson, and Milhouse fall asleep at the courier's office.
- "Father Knows Worst" gives a strange example of this: Bart is shown in class, lying on his desk and drooling heavily, with a tired, blank expression on his face. Whether or not he's actually asleep is unknown, but there are Google images that frame this scene as him having indeed fallen asleep in class and drooling in his sleep (actually the aforementioned scene with Bart freeze-framed mid-blink).
- Homer Simpson is pretty much the reigning champion of comical droolers in this show.
- South Park: Stan has drooled in his sleep at least twice:
- In the episode "Guitar Queer-O", when Stan passes out while playing "Heroin Hero", he is shown to have a line of drool oozing from the corner of his mouth.
- At one point in "Help, My Teenager Hates Me!", he is shown lying on his bed, sleeping with his mouth wide open and drooling; he promptly wipes the drool off his face after being awakened by his vibrating cell phone.
- SpongeBob SquarePants:
- Patrick does this almost every time he's asleep, with the worst and most nausea-inducing instance being in "Home Sweet Pineapple", where he turns into a literal, overflowing hot spring of drool, and SpongeBob — who is spending the night at his house after his pineapple home is destroyed by nematodes — ends up absorbing all of the saliva coming out of Patrick's mouth.
- Sandy is also prone to this, with the two prime examples being during her hibernation in "Survival of the Idiots" and once she's sleeping at the end of "Prehibernation Week".
- Even SpongeBob himself drools in his sleep every once in a while.
- In "Employee of the Month", a glob of drool falls from his upper lip as he's falling asleep to Squidward playing a lullaby on his clarinet.
- At the beginning of "I Was a Teenage Gary", he drools while asleep in his chair.
- In "Welcome to the Chum Bucket", he falls asleep in the middle of Plankton’s story and drools right on the latter's head.
- In the episode "Pickles", Mr. Krabs falls asleep and drools during the long wait for SpongeBob to remember how to make a krabby patty.
- Teen Titans Go!: In "Pirates", after really straining himself trying to be "intense" to impress Raven, Beast Boy falls asleep, and drool pools out of his mouth.
- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003): In "Lap of the Gods", at the library, Leo and Don discover that Mike is sound asleep and drooling on top of a book.
- Total Drama: In "Anything Yukon Do, I Can Do Better", Heather enjoys a solid nap in first class with a sleep mask and some drool slipping out of her mouth.
- We Bare Bears: In "Shush Ninjas", when the bears unintentionally put the children to sleep at the end of the episode, one little boy is shown with a lot of drool as he sleeps.
Real Life
- One of Dave Barry's columns
features a related phenomenon when he's sick with the flu:
Another symptom is that you cease brushing your teeth because (a) your teeth hurt and (b) you lack the strength. Midway through the brushing process, you'd have to lie down in front of the sink to rest for a couple of hours, and rivulets of toothpaste foam would dribble sideways out of your mouth, eventually hardening into crusty little toothpaste stalagmites that would bond your head permanently to the bathroom floor. - In his Australia book, Bill Bryson admits that he tends to sleep like this, at least while traveling.