Yep, these guys are baaaad.note
Nothing says "villain" more than a pair of dark, high-arching eyebrows!
It doesn't matter if a villain is smiling, laughing, crying, or frowning, Evil Eyebrows will remain at a permanently high arch on his or her forehead, giving the character a constant expression of menace or disdain.
Evil Eyebrows are usually darker and curve higher than any other character's eyebrows. The level of thickness varies—if the hero has thick eyebrows, the villain usually has razor thin ones to counter this. But if the hero has thin eyebrows, the villain's will usually be thicker than the fuzziest of caterpillars. Either way, they will still have the trademark "evil arch" that every bad guy seems to be born with.
Will sometimes have a scar crossing through one of the eyebrows to emphasize the evil.
Note: Please limit examples to evil characters with high-arching eyebrows. For evil characters with big or fuzzy eyebrows (that aren't arched), please add to Big Ol' Eyebrows or Angry Eyebrows.
Usually related to Unusual Eyebrows and Big Ol' Eyebrows. Frequently paired with Excessive Evil Eyeshadow.
Examples:
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Anime & Manga
- Vicious from Cowboy Bebop definitely has these.
- Vegeta from Dragon Ball Z has thick eyebrows that are always furrowed, even after his Heel–Face Turn.
- Hiruma of Eyeshield 21 probably has these on purpose, given how genre savvy he is.
- Subverted as Sasako from Shirokuma Cafe is so sweet, that it starts to annoy her when people point out that that she still smiles even when she tries to be angry. So she decides to wear fake evil eyebrows to let people know when she's angry. It fails.
- Dio Brando from JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. This is especially noticeable after he drains Joseph's blood, as seen here
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- Mobile Suit Gundam: The Witch from Mercury: Big Jerk on Campus Guel Jeturk has a perpetually furrowed brow that arches his eyebrows like this. After going through the Trauma Conga Line and becoming a kinder person, his expression softens and his eyebrows grow more level.
Comic Books
- [[Characters/The Joker The Joker]].
- Mickey Mouse Comic Universe: In Paul Murry's comics, you could always tell the bad guys by their eyebrows.
- Wonder Woman:
- Wonder Woman (1987): Sebastian Ballesteros, who ends up as the most irredeemable and least empathetic Cheetah, has thick dark high arched brows with little tufts at the peaks. Amusingly Jason Blood—a more famous DC property—has similar odd brows and spends a while in the book brainwashed into villainy, but he's usually an anti-hero.
- Wonder Woman (1942): Atomia is a monstrously Evil Redhead with long dark permanently arched brows.
Comic Strips
- Emperor Ming from Flash Gordon.
- From InSecurity we have Gabby, Roy and Charlene's baby daughter whose Big Ol' Eyebrows make her look creepy and evil... Particularly to Roy's Cloudcuckoolander Genki Girl cousin Sedine.
Films — Animation
- Aladdin (1992, Disney): Jafar; while everyone in the film has Big Ol' Eyebrows to a certain extent, Jafar's high-arched brows really stand out and occasionally appear to literally stick out above the bottom of his turban.
- Ratigan from The Great Mouse Detective. It makes sense since he is voiced by and modeled after Vincent Price who also has high-arching eyebrows.
- Frollo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame.
- Scar from The Lion King. He even has an evil scar over one of them.
- Laird and Hildegard from The Princess and the Pea.
- Jenner from The Secret of NIMH has eyebrows that arch all the way out of his head.
- Grandma Wu in Turning Red has these to go along with her Villainous Cheekbones but she's really just strict and intimidating rather than malicious.
Films — Live-Action
- The Gardener◊ from Adele Hasn't Had Her Dinner Yet has them.
- Dr Evil from the Austin Powers series.
- Even if you knew nothing about Jack Nicholson before seeing The Shining, you'd still be able to guess what's going to happen to him just by looking at his eyebrows alone.
- The Phoenician Scheme: Uncle Nubar has highly sculpted, hawk-like arched eyebrows that together with the beard make him look deeply menacing. He's also suspected of murdering Liesl's mother and is responsible for all of Zsa-Zsa's assassination attempts, and is the ultimate villain of the film.
Literature
- Lord Vetinari from the Discworld books is able to terrify people just by raising his eyebrow.
- The Grandmother: The rifleman who stalked and eventually seduced Viktorka had big, arched black eyebrows like a raven's wings, which are joined in the middle, which only serve to accentuate his ominous eyes.
- Snape from Harry Potter is often described as arching his eyebrows, and is a former Death Eater and current Sadist Teacher. He's played in the films, naturally enough, by the master of evil-eyebrow-raising, Alan Rickman. After a lot of uncertainty about his true allegiance, he ends up being a Nominal Hero.
- Queen Etheldredda from Septimus Heap, to the point that she even uses them to express a face of permanent disapproval.
Live-Action TV
- Game of Thrones: Along with her constant smirking, Cersei also usually has one or both eyebrows raised. They don't match her hair colour, which by contrast makes them all the more sinister.
- Heroes: Sylar has very impressive and thick eyebrows that are more of the "low and menacing" variety. He is far from nice.
- LazyTown: Robbie Rotten has thick, arched eyebrows to emphasize that he is, in fact, the villain.
- Seinfeld: After Uncle Leo gets his eyebrows singed off, Elaine draws some crude ones in place. They look so sinister that a doctor starts to interpret everything Leo says as being laced with anger and hostility.
- Star Trek:
- Subverted with Mr. Spock in Star Trek: The Original Series, though Dr. McCoy often lampshades that his high eyebrows, pointed ears, and green-tinted complexion make him look satanic.
- Homaged in Star Trek: Voyager with Dr Chaotica, the Ming the Merciless Expy in the holodeck program The Adventures of Captain Proton
- In the telenovela Tres Veces Ana, Angélique Boyer plays triplets: Ana Laura, Ana Lucia and Ana Leticia. Ana Laura and Ana Lucia have rounded natural eyebrows, while Ana Letitia has visible arched longer eyebrows. Of course, she is the Big Bad of the telenovela.
Pinballs
- The Devil in Devil's Dare has evil brow ridges.
- Buzz the gofer, as seen on the backglass for No Good Gofers.
Pro Wrestling
- Ox Baker had unusually thick, black pointed eyebrows.
- Sara Del Rey is prone to painting on a second set of eye brows when she's in "Forget athletic competition, I just want to hurt someone." mode and yes, she does often pair this look with excessive evil eyeshadow.
Theatre
- In Gounod's Faust, Mephistopheles gives probably the oldest example of trope on this page, along with Beard of Evil goatee, Evil Bass and Evil Laugh (the most known theatrical features of this high ranked demon, along with high and skinny figure kept from Goethe tragedy.
Video Games
- Seymour Guado from Final Fantasy X.
- The Administrator from Team Fortress 2.
- Bowser from Super Mario Bros.
- Shimano of Yakuza 1 has Big Ol' Eyebrows that form a nasty glare.
Webcomics
- Hooky: Hans and Hilde Wytte, respectively father and aunt of the protagonists and powerful witches that seek to establish the rule of witches over normal people out of revenge, both have high, thin, slanted eyebrows.
- Pixie and Brutus: In one strip where Brutus tries to teach Pixie self-defense, he draws heavy, slanted eyebrows on a teddy bear before the lesson to make it look more menacing.
Western Animation
- Jet of Avatar: The Last Airbender has some crazy eyebrows.
- Ben 10: Omniverse: The minor villain, Billy Billions, has very high-arching, black eyebrows, making him look more sinister.
- He Man And The Masters Of The Universe: A staple for evil female characters in this and She-Ra: Princess of Power . Prime examples are Evil-Lyn, Catra, and Scorpia. The male villains sometimes have this too, but usually, their eyebrows are fluffier.
- The Mad Doctor: The Doctor has large, thick eyebrows.
- Abraham Kane from Motorcity.
- Black Hat from Villainous (Cartoon Network) has them, befitting his sinister personality and Humanoid Abomination status.
- Dick Dastardly is usually shown with furrowed eyebrows in the shows which he's appeared (Wacky Races, Dastardly & Muttley in Their Flying Machines, Fender Bender 500) unless he's at the receiving end of Amusing Injuries. Especially pronounced in the Wacky Races Forever pilot.