Quotes / Facial Horror

Films — Live-Action

"WHAT KIND OF SICK FUCKING GAME ARE YOU PLAYING AT?! PUTTING ME ON A FUCKING BU—oh my god your face."

— Marla, Fight Club

"Do you know what it does to you? (M and Bond turn around to face Silva) Hydrogen cyanide? [he goes down on one knee, and removes a dental prosthesis from his upper palate, causing his left cheek to sag and revealing a gaunt, misshapen face and a row of rotted teeth.] Look upon your work... mother."

— Tiago Rodriguez/Raoul Silva, Skyfall

Literature

"No portrait of Morisset survives, and his appearance would have taxed the meager resources of any colonial artist… At La Albuera, a 32-inch mine-shell had exploded near him and left him with the mask of an ogre. His mouth ran diagonally upward and made peculiar whistling noises when he spoke. One eye was normal, but the other protruded like a staring pebble and seemed never to move. The cheekbone and jaw on one side had been smashed to fragments and, without cosmetic surgery, had re-knit to form a swollen mass like "a large yellow over-ripe melon"; he would defiantly thrust this cheek forward in conversation, as though daring his interlocutor to look away. For Morisset was not without bravado, and he was determined to convert his wound into a badge of bitter honor in the eyes of his equals and superiors."

— Robert Hughes, The Fatal Shore

The lightning had thrown the man’s face into sharp relief, and it was a face unlike any Harry had ever seen. It looked as though it had been carved out of weathered wood by someone who had only the vaguest idea of what human faces are supposed to look like, and was none too skilled with a chisel. Every inch of skin seemed to be scarred. The mouth looked like a diagonal gash, and a large chunk of the nose was missing.

— Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire on Alastor "Mad-Eye" Moody

It was a fortnight later that anybody saw Arthur Pale. His appearance had scarcely improved. The right side of his face was permanently disfigured; his right eye would never see anything ever again. The melt of his face had hardened in drips and globules, and a master had been forced to saw through it where it had stuck fast to his collar. His lips had not burned away, but drooped down on the side, nearly to the bottom of his chin, like an unfinished effigy of a clown in a grotesque parody of sadness. Depending on the light, his visage looked like wet leather or glue, like it would come away in your hands if you touched it, like if you watched him for long enough you would see his whole gelatinous profile drop all the way to the floor.

— The School Of Necromancy, by Set Sytes

Isaac quietly greeted the old man by the door, Joshua, whose Remaking had been very small and very cruel. A failed burglar, he had refused to testify against his gang, and the magister had ordered his silence made permanent: he had had his mouth taken away, sealed with a seamless stretch of flesh. Rather than live on tubes of soup pushed through his nose, Joshua had sliced himself a new mouth, but the pain had made him tremble, and it was a ragged, torn, unfinished-looking thing, a flaccid wound.

—Perdido Street Station

Sandor is a huge and heavily-muscled man. He has grey eyes, his nose is large and hooked, and his long hair is dark and thin. One side of Sandor's face is gaunt, with sharp cheekbones and a heavy brow, while the other side is a burned ruin of scars. Slick black flesh is pocked with craters and deep cracks that ooze red and wet, his ear is only a hole with a stump, and a hint of bone shows on his jaw. The scars extend down to his throat. There is a twisted mass of scars around his eye, which is still good, not harmed by the fire, but he has no lips on that side. Sandor brushes his hair so that it covers his burned side, since no hair grows there.

— Description of Sandor Clegane taken from the wiki of Ice and Fire

You're the ugliest woman I've ever seen, but don't think I can't make you uglier. You want a nose like mine? Fight me, and you'll get one. And two eyes, that's too many. One scream out o' you, and I'll pop one out and make you eat it, and then I'll pull your fucking teeth out one by one.

— Description of what Rorge threatens to do to Brienne taken from the wiki of Ice and Fire

Live-Action TV

Leper: I am a dead man.
Cadfael: But there was one Lazarus who did rise again from his tomb... to the great joy of his kinswomen.
[The leper pauses, then removes his mask.]
Leper: Is this the face that made his sisters glad?

— Cadfael, "The Leper of St. Giles"

"You stinking offal, Morgus! LOOK AT ME! (pulls off his mask to reveal his horribly burned face) Look at me!"

— Sharaz Jek, Doctor Who, "The Caves of Androzani"

Music

I got no lips, I got no tongue
Where there were eyes there's only space
I got not lips, I got no tongue
I got a broken face!
Uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh, uh-huh!

—"Broken Face", The Pixies

Tabletop Games

"Andy's face is normally a curved plate of skin over featureless underlying bone. Every night, however, Andy goes through the miserable torture of chiseling open holes for his eyes and ears (he ignores the flat nose). To open his mouth, however, Andy cracks open a jagged slash where his lips once were, past the jaw's hinges to the edge of the skull's facial plate. This allows him to bite victims, perforating their skin with the jagged and broken bone around his maw and giving him a wide, ear-to-ear gash."

— Vampire: The Masquerade - Mexico City By Night

You feel a terrible need to reveal your true face. Nothing can distract or dissuade you. Using blades, hooks, and other fearsome tools, you tear and cut, pull and poke, reforming your features to achieve the perfection you know lays hidden beneath. Each stroke of the blade brings tears to your eyes and sighs from your drooling mouth. The end result is hideous, and you gain the Terrifying Talent.

—The Face Of Slaanesh gift, Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay: Tome Of Corruption

Video Games

I'm the last one that's standing, don't try to stand in my way
'Cause I've been up against better, just take a look at my face!

— "Theme of Infinite", Sonic Forces

Carson: AAAARGH! Oh, God, Gimble got to you too? Man, that's inhumane! Looks like he sliced up your face and sewed it back together in the wrong order!
Nosferatu Player Character: It's a birthmark.

— Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines

"You fucked up my face."

— Mitchell, Hunt Downthe Freeman

Western Animation

"Normal teenagers worry about bad skin. I don't have that luxury. My father decided to teach me a permanent lesson — on my face!"

— Zuko, Avatar: The Last Airbender

Preston Northwest: I would just like to say that as a rich capitalist, I welcome your tyrannical rule. Perhaps I can be one of your, uh, Horsemen of the Apocalypse?
Pacifica Northwest: Dad!
Preston: Not now, sweetie. The grownups are talking.
Bill Cipher: Oh, wow, that's a great offer! How 'bout, instead, I shuffle the functions of every hole in your face?

— Gravity Falls

"Hey, SpongeBo-ooooob~? (sulfur blasts him in the face) Well... at least I still have my personality."

— Clay, SpongeBob SquarePants, "Prehibernation Week"

"I... AM... CHICKENHOUND! And your father did THIS to me! (pulls off his hood to reveal his scars)"

— Slagar the Cruel, Redwall

"Oh my God! I look like... I look like I have a scrotum for a face!"

— Emperor Palpatine, Robot Chicken

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