The Thylacine

Title: The Thylacine
Date: Unknown
Category: School Assignment
Current Status: Recycled

At first look, I simply assumed this was another fine science assignment featuring my stellar artwork. I see a grade, another exceptional one, of a "100 A+ Super!" but I have no earthly idea what the assignment was. I mean, seriously, examine this thing. It's mostly pre-typed text from some group called "The Learning Works" that tells the whole sordid tale of the Tasmanian Wolf, also known as the Thylacine, which sounds more like a Greek play than a bizarre canine marsupial. Within the text, I made the bold move of underlining the word "rats." Meanwhile, the picture above is not solely my creation. You can see the faint lines from the original picture that have been faded from the state of the art 1980's photocopying process. I can only assume that our assignment was to draw the Thylacine, even though it was still easy enough to make out the outline.
So, I drew the thing based on the body I could partially see. My drawing looks like the offspring of Lassie and Teddy Ruxpin after one too many tequila shooters at the Teddy Bear Picnic. I wasn't even smart enough to include the trademark stripes on the back end of the creature that gave it its distinctive appearance.
Perhaps my teacher was mightily impressed by my inclusion of several hunters who are no doubt trying to claim the bounty placed on this creature around the turn of the 20th century. You'll notice the two visible hunters, one on the left in the bush and one on the right in the bush, with their awesome shotgun bazookas. There must be a third hunter, since there are two shoots echoing through the forest at the top of the page and neither of the hunters we can see are even holding their shotgun bazookas, despite the close proximity of the target. Meanwhile, the thylacine stands in the open grinning like a moron. No wonder they became extinct... or mostly extinct since people still claim to see them. They are officially listed as extinct, but like the chupacabra, reports of the creature still turn up.
So, I'm really not sure what I was graded on here and the limited amount of content that I added doesn't seem remotely worthy of the high grade I received.

Interesting note about the Thylacine... it might be partially responsible for helping the werewolf story grow. Thylacines, while not actually a canine, had very dog and wolflike characteristics. It is a marsupial, though. It apparently was not a great runner and would sometimes hop around on it's hind legs. It could also stand upright for short periods of time. Plus, it had this crazy jaw that allowed it to open its mouth in a way that made it look huge. So, it's possible that people who didn't know better could encounter one, see it rear up and open it's gaping maw and think, hey, werewolf!

Now back to your regularly scheduled internet.