The Anime Eyebrow

Posted: March 28, 2009 | Author: flomu | Filed under: Uncategorized |5 Comments »

I spent wasted a lot of time on this thing, so appreciate it!

So after putting up the last post, I realized… “Hey, what’s up with anime eyebrows?” And thus this post was born.  [I’m saying that a lot, huh?]

NOTE: Don’t worry, I watched Clannad ~AS~ 24, but I’m just too lazy to put up my opinions on the series as a whole right now.  I’ll do it on Monday, most likely.

Amarao’s eyebrows are probably the most well-known and distinctive in all of anime.  His eyebrows are bigger than his eyes, and occasionally fall off.  You could probably land a plane on one of those things.

So what does qualities does an eyebrow have in anime?

Well…

 

Eyebrow Thickness

There’s the thick, the beyond-thick (Amarao), the thin…

And the just right medium…

Personally, I like the last one the most, since it’s the most realistic of the three (unless you trim your eyebrows or have extremely bushy ones).

 

 

Eyebrow Length

Usually, anime eyebrows are all around the same length, but there are some notable exceptions to this rule.

Nagi is probably the most recent and most significant exception here.

Her eyebrows are tiny, following an ancient tradition (she’s a goddess from the days of lore [I command you to commend me on my word choice and alliteration!], remember?).

When I first started watching Kannagi, the first thing I noticed about it (besides its being the best anime of all time *shifty eyes*) was that Nagi has some tiny eyebrows.

The standard anime eyebrow length is approximately equal to the length of the upper eyelash, but Nagi’s eyebrow is a third of her eyelash length, if that.

Good/Bad?  Well, the jury’s out for that one.
It’s pretty awkward the first few times Nagi appears on the screen, but I guess got used to it after an episode or two.

 

As for long brows, I honestly can’t think of a character with particularly lengthy eyebrows.
Hmn.

The characters of Kanon (2006) have some long eyebrows, I guess?  I don’t really know. @___@;

 

 

Through the hair or behind the hair?

versus
 

I hate to side with Akikan! on something, but I actually prefer eyebrows > hair.

Mikoto-sama says so, so it must be the right way, no?

Usually, I’m all for realism, but in this aspect, I’m going with anime stereotypes.

It allows characters’ emotions to be seen much more clearly, as there’s no hair to block out something like this:

 

WTF Eyebrows

Strike Witches has some creepy eyebrows, seriously.

Some characters have normal anime eyebrows, and others have weird eyebrows that look like they came straight from the hands of a pre-schooler: a general area filled with random lines.  Phooie.

I guess this could go under “long brow,” but this looks like more of a mistake on Genshiken‘s part…

 

I’m not too sure as to what purpose this post is supposed to serve (I didn’t really do much here beside present one awesome collage, come to think of it…).

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