Perpetual Frowners in Live-Action TV.
- 24: Greg Seaton never cracks a smile, remaining terminally serious and off-setting his Affably Evil boss Jonas Hodges' more jovial demeanour.
- Wednesday Addams from The Addams Family, any version. (Not counting Addams Family Reunion) When she smiled after being brainwashed in Addams Family Values, it deeply unnerved all onlookers.
- "She's scaring me!"
- Not so much in the original TV series. She was quite cheerful there.
- However, she was in The New Yorker comics, which preceded the live-action show.
- Angel
- Angel smiles so rarely that when he does it's enough of an event that one of the other characters may feel called upon to remark on it.
- Connor seems to have inherited this from Angel, which Willow lampshades.
Willow: "And the sneer's genetic, who knew?" - In Best Motoring, Motoharu Kurosawa and Akihiko Nakaya were known for their stoicism, in comparison to the other drivers who were known for being all smiles.
- Mike Ehrmantraut from Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul has a perpetual world-weary Surrounded by Idiots look stuck on his face. At best he can muster up a neutral tired face, but only when he's with his granddaughter.
- Brooklyn Nine-Nine:
- Captain Raymond Holt rarely expresses any other emotion, and he has a hard face when he says he's happy.
- Detective Rosa Diaz is nearly always seen scowling — so much so that when she does smile, it usually comes across as discomforting. Though, at the end of "The Pontiac Bandit Returns", she's so happy about the Giggle Pig drug bust that she smiles broadly, surprising even herself.Rosa: [grinning ear to ear] How do people do this with their face muscles normally?
- Chasing Life: Ford is usually morose looking, if not outright frowning and scowling, which makes sense given her personality.
- Aaron Hotchner from Criminal Minds is more serious than actually grumpy, but he has a resting face that's practically a Death Glare. He's The Stoic and doesn't really emote all that much, but he does have a truly lovely smile.
- Dead of Summer: Drew usually scowls or looks morose. Once we learn that he's a trans boy stressed out by hiding his gender and having his mother reject him, it isn't surprising.
- Doctor Who:
- The Twelfth Doctor is the "serious and focused" aspect of this trope, occasionally broken by a manic grin that rivals the Fourth Doctor's Cheshire Cat Grin. He does have a cute, kinder smile
◊ but it shows up once in a blue moon — usually aimed at Clara. - From the original series, there is Sara Kingdom, a soldier from a dystopian future.
- The Twelfth Doctor is the "serious and focused" aspect of this trope, occasionally broken by a manic grin that rivals the Fourth Doctor's Cheshire Cat Grin. He does have a cute, kinder smile
- Mid-20th-century Variety Show host Ed Sullivan was famous for almost never smiling on camera, though he didn't exactly frown per se, he often had a rather stern look on his face. When he did smile, it was actually neither glurge nor Nightmare Fuel, but his smiles were always notable for their extreme brevity. One time when he told comedian Red Skelton "It's wonderful to see your smiling face again." Skelton replied, "That's more than I can say for you." Sullivan's response was "That's not fair, you know I can smile. Like this." At which point he flashed a perfectly cheerful smile, for about a tenth of a second before returning to his stern, stoic look.
- Killer Frost, the Superpowered Evil Side of Dr. Caitlin Snow in The Flash (2014), is always seen with a frown on her face to show her cold personality. Even after her Heel–Face Turn, it's still kept.
- Game of Thrones:
- Royal executioner Ser Ilyn Payne is never seen without a belligerent scowl.
- Tywin is also a frowner, like his book characterization. The closest thing he comes to a smile or laugh is a brief guffaw at one of Arya Stark's remarks. In the books, Lord Tywin is reputed to have smiled on four occasions: when he married his first cousin Joanna, when Aerys Targaryen made him Hand of the King, when Jaime and Cersei were born, and when he extinguished the two noble houses that had mocked and defied his weak-willed father. Since that last one, just the threat of him smiling again has been enough to get people to do whatever he wants...and when he can't be there to personally smile, he sends a musician to play a song about that last one.
- Cersei's very prominent brows emanate hatred even during her rare moments of levity.
- Gregor's unfriendliness is always reflected in his face. And that's one of his less distasteful traits.
- Stannis is almost always scowling or displaying a stiff rictus.
- Aeron Greyjoy is yet to dislodge his expression from a grim, dour frown.
- In The Golden Girls, one of Rose Nylund's St. Olaf Stories is about a Perpetual Frowner named Mean Old Lady Hickenlooper (her actual name), who was feared by the neighborhood kids because she always frowned. It turns out that this was because she was born without smiling muscles. After Rose points out that "A frown is just a smile turned upside down", Hickenlooper takes to standing on her head and waving hello whenever Rose passes by.
- Bart Bass in Gossip Girl. Lampshaded by Eric: "He only has one facial expression. He scares me." Whenever he does try to act in a friendly or romantic manner, it's very disturbing and clearly fake.
- Will Graham from Hannibal, due to his anxiety and inner demons. He's seen relaxing around his numerous dogs, though.
- Hawkeye (2021): Even as a child, Maya usually looks solemn and rarely smiles. When grown up, she mostly shows little emotion, looking morose or angry if emotional at all most often.
- Karl Pilkington from An Idiot Abroad. If he is smiling, you can guarantee it won't last for long, as Ricky Gervais has a seemingly endless list of things planned to annoy Karl.
- And retains this role in The Ricky Gervais Show. Ricky savors the one instance he actually manages to make Karl laugh.
- This is a stereotype among characters of Kamen Rider, most often secondary riders.
- Ryu Terui/Kamen Rider Accel is such a grim person that even his neutral face is a scowl. Spending time with the halfboiled detective Shotaro helps him turn back into the nice person he used to be. He retains use of the scowl for work purposes (he is a cop).
- Kaito Kumon/Armored Rider Baron has scowl, deeper scowl, and Death Glare. That's about his range of expressions. He has not smiled once through the whole story. While this is justified considering his past and motivation, it still makes for interesting interactions when he is replaced by Keet impostor.
- Kiriko Shijima is always uptight and professional. Robot War? No problem. Being stuck in the loony bin unit? Still no problem. The instances of When She Smiles have her deny that anything happened.
- Hiiro Kagami/Kamen Rider Brave usually has disappOOroving faces coming along with his cold attitude that goes up to Comically Serious level. It's to cope with the pressure of being a surgeon and to balance out his (usually very) zany father. One way or another, spending time with Emu and resolving some of his issues lightens him up to healthier level.
- Taiga Hanaya/Kamen Rider Snipe was scowling for his life's worth until he got stuck with Nico Saiba. She can see right through him and doesn't tolerate his behavior. Spending time with her and resolving his issues (some of them, that is) helps him get better.
- Love and Destiny: At first Jiu Chen frowns almost constantly — in front of other people, at least.
- The Mandalorian Seasons 1-2 have the title character come off as this, by only showing his face during some anxiety-inducing experiences. When something in those episodes does make him smile, he only gives a fleeting smirk before reverting to a stern or solemn expression.
- A more obviously-frowning Muppet is Beaker. The way his mouth is cut into his cylindrical head gives him an exceedingly-obvious frown. Nevertheless, the way he talks (itself difficult given he's one of two The Unintelligibles from The Muppet Show) helps to alter the meaning of his perpetual frown: sadness, worry, fright, frustration, whatever. Sam the Eagle also has a permanent frown on his face with a seemingly stern or angry look, helping contribute to his Comically Serious persona.
- Emma Swan's default expression on Once Upon a Time is a frown mainly because she's still wrapping around her head that All Myths Are True, her parents are Snow White and Prince Charming and they haven't aged in 28 years and that she's The Chosen One.
- Parks and Recreation has Ron Swanson. Even when he's being nice, he's stern. The only thing that makes him smile is the collapse of the Pawnee government, Lil' Sebastian the pony, and sometimes his family.
- Power Rangers RPM:
- Dillon/RPM Black was once asked whether brooding comes naturally to him or he has to practice in the mirror every morning. He simply prefers to maintain the reputation of a cranky tough guy who only looks out for himself. Summer realized this is not true pretty early on, but mostly just worked on staying positive herself and hoped it will rub off on him. It did.
- Doctor K, team's mentor is an aloof, snarky genius with no social skills, so the Rangers are baffled when they see her happy for the first time.
- Detective Cornell in the ABC miniseries Secrets & Lies. Pretty much only smiles when making a smug comment towards Ben Crawford, whose accused of murdering a child.
- Live action/puppetry: The grouchy Oscar and Bert on Sesame Street. All the more remarkable in that their faces aren't articulated enough to make it obvious that they're frowning — Carroll Spinney and Frank Oz rely on their ability to create a character for that.
- Stargate SG-1: Teal'c as played by Christopher Judge.
- You try smiling after your forehead is cut with an Orak knife and molten gold is poured into the wound. Makes a kick-ass tattoo, though.
- Compare with Christopher Judge himself, who always seems cheerful.
- In Stargate Atlantis Rodney Mckay personifies the D: face, when he isn't scowling/whining/complaining.
- Ronon Dex scowls half the time, usually to intimidate someone (he's 6'4"), although he has been shown to smile occasionally.
- This becomes hilarious in a crossover episode where Teal'c and Ronon are trying to out-scowl each other before they beat the crap out of each other.
- Ronon Dex scowls half the time, usually to intimidate someone (he's 6'4"), although he has been shown to smile occasionally.
- Star Trek:
- Vulcans rarely show any facial expressions other than stoic frowning. The oft-pointed eyebrows add to this, as Spock, Tuvok, and T'Pol demonstrate.
- Worf, son of Mogh does not smile. (Klingons, in general, tend to be fairly scowly, but Worf makes frowning an art form.)
- Admiral Bill Ross is rarely seen when he's not in a dour mood. Then again, he's leading a Federation fleet through a long and grueling war, which does nothing good for his morale.
- The Tunnel: Elise never smiles. Her usual expression is a blank or dour look, if not an actual frown.
- The Twilight Zone (1959): In "A Piano in the House", the butler Marvin never smiles to the point that Fitzgerald Fortune considers firing him because he finds his presence depressing. However, the piano reveals that Marvin is a very happy person who often has to stop himself from laughing at Fortune when he has one of his tantrums.
- Uchu Sentai Kyuranger: Stinger/Sasori Orange didn't come to Orion to make friends, so he is usually in the background scowling at his teammates, who do their best at averting this. They commonly behave like a squad of Annoying Younger Siblings and the only one who does not is Kotaro, the only actual child on the team. Stinger is adorably awkward when he is not Mrs. Tough Guy, so his teammates don't take his attitude at face value all the time after they got to see under it.
- Blitzabeth, one of the main characters in the Norwegian children's television show Uhu, is always frowning, always complaining, and always flinging biting and sarcastic comments to everyone. The show takes place in a Haunted House, and the main characters are ghosts who, before being allowed to cross into the afterlife, have to perform some kind of task as a test; Blitzabeth arrives at the ghost house in the very first episode and is given the task to stop frowning and complaining. It takes her the entire series to manage.
- Stefan Salvatore from The Vampire Diaries, in more episodes than not. You can tell that if he's smiling things must be going really, really well. This was lampshaded by Caroline in Season 2.
- The Walking Dead (2010): Magna is a very sullen person and rarely smiles.
