An extremely old Japanese artistic convention is giving men bushy eyebrows. The manly
oyaji usually has them, and it makes his expressions more imposing and tougher. A lot of older
shonen manga use this style to great effect. Unless it's specifically part of the art style,
Big Ol' Eyebrows are a common
Art Shift gag when a character is being overdramatic.
Women tend to get very thin eyebrows. Thicker eyebrows are usually just a convention to make their faces more noticeable or make their facial expressions funnier. But in a few anime, woman have thicker eyebrows which resemble long commas. It's the case of Momoko from
Ojamajo Doremi and Honoka, Saki and Kurumi from the
Pretty Cure franchise.
Usually related to
Evil Eyebrows.
Hot-Blooded Sideburns is a
Sister Trope, and often shows up along side this one. See also
Big Ol' Unibrow. A Subtrope of
Unusual Eyebrows.
Example subpages:
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Literature
- Gandalf in The Hobbit is described as having gigantic eyebrows.
'Good morning' said Bilbo, and he meant it. [...] But Gandalf looked at him from under long bushy eyebrows that stuck out further than the brim of his shady hat.
- The Rankin/Bass animated versions of The Hobbit and The Return Of The King took this maybe too literally, and gave Gandalf a titanic, impossibly bushy unibrow that, along with his similarly oversized beard, completely frames his (also huge) nose and eyes. His freaky appearance is used to great effect when he introduces himself with an extreme closeup shot.
- Ogier in The Wheel of Time are described to all have very large eyebrows.
- In P. G. Wodehouse's Jeeves and Wooster stories, nerve specialist Rodrick Glossop is described as being bald with enormous eyebrows.
Puppetry
- A lot of the male characters found in Gerry Anderson's Supermarionation shows have pretty large eyebrows, but none win better than Mike Mercury of Supercar, seriously
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- Ventriloquist Jeff Dunham has a puppet, Achmed the Dead Terrorist, who has gigantic eyebrows despite being a skeleton. They're used to convey his emotions, since he has no other facial features to do so with - and they work surprisingly well.
