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Eyepatch of Power

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"You can't spell 'warrior' without one 'I'."

Something covers one of the character's eyes. It might be an eyepatch, a particularly concealing haircut, or a tilted Martial Arts Headband. Whatever it is, and however it came to be, through Fashionable Asymmetry it neatly conveys the fact that the wearer is either 1) an experienced combatant or 2) secretly a badass.

Perhaps both.

These characters rarely experience any problems with depth perception or suffer from the resulting reduced field of vision. In fact, sometimes the Eyepatch of Power covers a perfectly functional — or specially functional — eye instead of the empty hole one might suspect. This is sometimes a technique of The Trickster. Main characters will often gain an eyepatch as a Future Badass or Evil Twin.

Pirates often have eye patches as a Stock Costume Trait, which is a separate thematic concept — see Dressed to Plunder — but the overlap of badassery and piracy is significant enough to mention. This is partially Truth in Television, pirates in real life did often wear eye patches regularly, but mainly because on sailing ships in the 18th century there were over a thousand different ways one could lose body parts, including eyes (this is also the reason why hooks for hands and peg legs are commonly associated with them as well, seeing as such items could easily be improvised using materials already on a ship to compensate for missing limbs). In this case, sailors didn't wear eye patches to look tough so much as they did because on average people have an easier time looking at a piece of cloth over one eye than at the scarred tissue where the eye used to be. Furthermore, even pirates (and other seamen) with two functioning eyes were wont to wear eyepatches: since it's so dark belowdecks, having one eye always in darkness made it easier to adjust.

In The Future, rough and tumble outlaws will often have a single, obvious cybernetic eye which will give them some sort of special holdout ability or Super-Senses.

When the Norse god Odin traded an eye for a drink from Mimir's well of knowledge, he made this trope Older Than Print.

Related to Blind Seer—power gain through the loss of an eye is a repeating motif in literature, like the Odin example above.

See also: Magical Eye, Mask Power, Eyes Always Shut, and if you're masochistic, Eye Scream. For characters that weren't wearing it the last time you saw them, see Eyepatch After Time Skip. See also Blindfolded Vision, where a blindfolded combatant is no worse off (or better!) than their opponents. May result because Scars are Forever.


Examples:

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  • Eyepatches and concealing hairdos abound in Leiji Matsumoto's works (Captain Harlock, Queen Emeraldas, Space Battleship Yamato).
  • Doraemon: Nobita and the Haunts of Evil: The dangerous Mook Lieutenant of Daburanda''s army is a wolfhound named Saberu, who sports an eyepatch over his left eye. He's also the only named villain who's an actual threat in direct combat, being a very competent Master Swordsman.
  • In 11eyes, Kakeru has a blind right eye, covered by an overly large eyepatch, which grants him the power of precognition.
  • Fire Force: Both Captain Burns and Joker, two powerful fighters in their own right, wear eyepatches on opposite sides. And it's not a coincidence. Both of them were partners once, and went their separate ways after a mission led to their respective eyes literally burning out of their skulls from staring right into the setting's equivalent of Hell itself.
  • Akito from Air Gear's eyepatch acts as an indicator as to which half of his Split Personality is in charge: if over the right eye, sweet and innocent Akito is in control. Over the left eye, violent and brash Agito takes over. Without the eyepatch, Agito still has control, but with more power.
  • Akachi from Arata: The Legend wears one after implanting their eye in another character.
  • Nice Holystone of Baccano!, who conceals a small but functional bomb within the empty eye socket covered by her eyepatch. A bomb is also how she lost the eye in the first place.
  • In the Berserk prototype story, Guts has an eyepatch. He gives it away as a souvenir at the end. In the actual manga Guts averts this, as even though his right eye is missing/heavily damaged after being clawed out by a demon during the Eclipse, he doesn't wear an eyepatch; he just... keeps his eyelid closed.
  • The Big O: Norman has one, along with a mustache.
  • Ciel Phantomhive of Black Butler has one to hide his Magical Eye pentagram; the sign of his Deal with the Devil contract.
  • In Black Cat, Sven Vollfied wears an eyepatch over his right eye, which has the ability to see a few seconds into the future. If he uses it extensively, it can cause extreme exhaustion. He has the eye from his old partner Lloyd who had these powers of seeing the future. Foreseeing Sven's death, Lloyd went to intervene and was consequently killed himself. Sven lost an eye in the process but was given a transplant from Lloyd who had registered as an organ donor not long before.
    • Later on in the manga, his eye can greatly accelerate his perception of motion so everything appears slowed down, allowing him to easily dodge bullets, punches, and anything else that comes flying at him. He also gets better at using his Magical Eye so he doesn't need his Eyepatch Of Power as often, but he keeps it anyway. (Probably because it looks badass.)
  • For some unexplained reason in Bludgeoning Angel Dokurochan her younger but older looking sister Zakuro wears an eye patch.
  • Bleach:
    • Kenpachi Zaraki hides one (functioning) eye under an eyepatch made from a creature that eats his Battle Aura, which allows him to fight at a lower power-level so as not to crush lesser opponents and ruin all the fun so quickly.
    • Kenpachi's evil counterpart, the Quinto Espada Nnoitra Gilga, also has an eyepatch, which conceals his Hollow hole and the remnants of his mask.
    • Coyote Starrk's release gives him what's either an eyepatch or a scouter. When he does this, he goes from Brilliant, but Lazy to a Not-So-Harmless Villain.
    • Shunsui Kyoraku starts using one of these after Robert Accutrone subjects him to Eye Scream by shooting his right eye. Every now and then, Kubo mistakenly draws the eye intact.
    • One of the original Thirteen Court Guard Captains, Furoufushi Saitou, wears an eyepatch and being part of the strongest generation of the Division Captains this trope is a given.
  • Saya Kisaragi from Blood-C gets one in episode 12, after getting the left half of her head blown off and living to tell. So she rips her clothes and covers her injury as her Healing Factor slowly kicks in...
  • In Brave10, Rokurou hides his right eye behind bandages to conceal the power of the Water Crest eye, which lets him suck out people's memories and store limitless amounts of knowledge in it. He loses it to Anastasia when she betrays the Braves and the eyepatch starts doing its normal job...Or so it would seem, until the sequel, at which point it's revealed he's gone and put his other family heirloom, the God's Jewel, in the socket to make up for it and is now hiding that.
  • Othinus from A Certain Magical Index, much like her mythological counterpart. Othinus has acquired the position of majin (magic god) and is thus one of the most powerful beings in the world.
  • Chainsaw Man:
    • Himeno, one of the more experienced devil hunters, has an eyepatch hiding her right eye. She gave up her right eye to the Ghost Devil for a devil contract in exchange for borrowing some of its supernatural power.
    • Quanxi also bears one and, according to her former buddy Kishibe, would win in a bare-knuckle fighting tournament of all of humanity. She's also a weapon devil hybrid (presumably bow), making her nigh-unkillable. Her eyepatch hides an arrow which acts as the switch for the transformation when removed, explaining why her regeneration doesn't just give her a new eye.
  • Lelouch Lamperouge of Code Geass has a variation in the second season of the show, as now that his geass in his eye is in Power Incontinence mode, he has to wear a special contact lens over it to hide that power in civilian life.
    • A (slightly) more straight example can be found in Knight Of One Bismarck Waldstein, who has his left eye sewn shut. This is to seal his always-on Geass, which allows him to predict an opponent's movement.
    • When Jeremiah Gottwald opens his left eye, he can nullify any Geass power. Being a badass already, it made it easy for him to deal with Rolo and Lelouch when they were unable to use their Geass on him. Lelouch outsmarts him, though, because he's savvy enough not to rely exclusively on Geass.
    • "Julius Kingsly" in the OVA Code Geass: Akito the Exiled also has his left eye covered by a particularly extravagant eye patch, almost certainly to prevent him from using his Geass.
  • In Comic Girls, The Hero of Tsubasa's Shōnen manga is a traditional hero wearing this and Badass Cape. Tsubasa herself sometimes wear both when she acts him out for story writing.
  • Lavi from D.Gray-Man wears an eye patch over his right eye. Under it he hides a secret "only known to Bookmen". Nobody know what it is. Yet. And God knows how long til we find out.
    • Cross Marian's right eye is covered by a faceplate. And since he was either killed or was Put on a Bus, "God knows how long till we find out." (Because when an eye is covered by something, you know it's covered for a reason...)
  • In The Daughter of Twenty Faces, Ken gets one after losing an eye and turns Darker and Edgier as a result.
  • An odd and extremely narmy version of this is combined with Mask Power in Dragonaut: The Resonance. When Kazuki, the Rival Turned Evil, returns from a No One Could Survive That! moment, he's wearing an eyepatch... as a mask. It makes it look like he has a thong on his head.
  • Jay Rock of Fang of the Sun Dougram is more or less Che Guevara with an eyepatch. Not surprisingly, he's the show's local avatar of the god of Badass.
  • Fullmetal Alchemist:
    • Führer King Bradley uses a patch to hide his "Ultimate Eye", his left eye which holds his Ouroboros that gives him the foresight to see all possible outcomes of a given situation, allowing him to predict the moves of any opponent before they happen. His original eye rotted out long ago once he graduated from Führer school.
    • Bradley's eye in the first anime didn't let him see the future, but it let him see just about everything else. It was used to great effect in his fight with Mustang were swinging his sword altered the air currents in the room and diverted Mustang's attacks.
    • In the end of the first anime, Mustang kills Bradley but ends up losing his eye himself. He starts using an eyepatch afterward.
  • The Genbu Seishi Hikitsu from Fushigi Yuugi and Fushigi Yuugi: Genbu Kaiden wears an eyepatch over his right eye, which he calls "Shikyokan". The eye forces the person looking into it to remember their worst memories, letting him see these as well, and beyond.
  • Minene Uryu of Future Diary gains an eyepatch after becoming blind in one in a fight with protagonist Yukiteru Amano, and said eye is plucked out by Yomotsu Hirsaka.
  • Saito from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex has a cybernetic implant that resembles an eyepatch. His left eye was replaced with the "Hawkeye", a prosthetic eye that interfaces with satellites to allow for shots of incredible accuracy.
  • Gintama has Kyuubei (based on Yagyu Jubei in the Real Life examples below) and Takasugi. Kyuubei got hers as a child after being injured protecting Tae.
  • Chigusa Tsukikage from Glass Mask uses her long and messy black hair to cover the scars on her face after a terrible on-stage accident.
  • Mobile Suit Gundam 00:
    • Subverted, as while the eyepatch Lockon Stratos receives later in the series does make him look more badass (if this is even possible for stupid, sexy Lockon), it gives Ali an advantage in the final fight causing Lockon to lose their fight and die.
    • Allelujah's hair works similarly to an eyepatch, as it shows which side of him is fighting. If you can see the right eye, you are fighting pacifist, gentle Allelujah. See the left eye, you are fighting the rather terrifying Hallelujah. See both eyes, you are fighting the infinitely scarier gestalt of the two.
  • Hellsing has two examples, the first being the mercenary Pip Bernadotte and the second being Integra after her eye was damaged in the final battle.
  • Ikki Tousen:
    • Ryoumo, a.k.a. Battle Vixens, wears a medical bandage over her left eye. it's eventually revealed that the eyepatch is there to help Seal Evil (a "dragon" berserker spirit) In A Can.
    • Later when Kakouton Genjou has an eye gouged out saving Sousou from Koushaji's fatal needles he starts sporting a rather spiffy patch with a skull and bones motif. This is a Shout-Out to and/or Generation Xerox of his past incarnation Xiahou Dun of Romance of the Three Kingdoms fame, seen below under "Real Life".
  • Laura Bodewig from Infinite Stratos has an eyepatch to conceal her nanomachine-enhanced golden super-eye, named Odin's Eye, or the Eye that Surpasses the World. It heightens the nerve processing to the brain, giving much faster reactions, to make her a better pilot.
  • Elder Kaede from Inuyasha wears one because she lost her eye during an attack of demons when she was a little girl.
  • Midari of Kakegurui, who lost an eye by her own hands, paying a debt, and smiling as she did so - which also made her realize she liked both gambling and pain.
  • Jiyu Nanohana from Jubei-chan received a "Lovely Eyepatch" that turned her into a super swordswoman. Her Rival Freesia in the second season had a similar one.
  • Nui Harime from Kill la Kill has an eyepatch shaped like a combination of the katakana of her name. She is one of the most powerful fighters due to the Life Fibers in her body.
  • Farfarello of Knight Hunters. It doesn't seem to slow him down much.
  • Gantai from Koi Koi 7 has one to conceal her mechanical eye. Fitting to the trope, she's incredibly dangerous when she goes berserk.
  • KonoSuba: Even though both of her eyes are fine, Megumin wears an eyepatch solely because she thinks it looks cool.
  • Moritsugu Reiji's Machina Verdant in Linebarrels of Iron has one eye destroyed, odd considering that like other machina it can heal given time, and Kouichi actually does try to use this to his advantage imagine his shock when Verdant suddenly heals its right eye after he took notice of the blind spot, Reiji goes on to state that verdant deliberately left the eye permanently damaged as a means of testing opponents.
  • Retsudou from Lone Wolf and Cub got his after the hero tried to kill him by means of an arrow through the eye. It didn't work.
  • In Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions!, Rikka wears an eyepatch under the delusion of being a seal to her "Evil Eye".
  • Cinque of Lyrical Nanoha. She once fought against an S-Rank mage. She lost her eye, he lost his life. Also an invoked trope for Cinque, as she could've gotten an artificial eye replacement after losing her eye in battle, but she chooses not to. Cypha from Force also wears one.
  • In MÄR, the Chess Piece Candice has one of these in addition to a mask. The eyepatch conceals a magic stone instead of an empty socket, which she uses as a Dimension Ärm.
  • Dr. Hell from Mazinger Z wore one in the sequel series, Great Mazinger.
    • A minor character showed up in one chapter also wore one. He was a homeless thief and street urchin, and the eyepatch furthered the sensation of he was a badass in one fight.
    • Minister Zurill of UFO Robo Grendizer was a Badass Bookworm with one eyepatch covering his left eye.
  • In My Hero Academia, Shota Aizawa, Eraser Head, starts wearing one after he loses an eye during the Paranormal Liberation War arc.
  • Naruto:
    • Kakashi hides a special eye behind his Martial Arts Headband. In fact, he had to switch out his old eye for it...
    • A later chapter shows that Danzo has it too.
    • In fact, there are a lot of minor ninja with eyepatches/coverings including Kuromaru (who for the uninformed is a dog) and Tonbo Tobitake, who has a covering for both eyes. The above revelation has started a joke among the fandom that anyone who is covering their eye or an arm (doesn't even need to be with an eyepatch; it can just be with hair), they must be hiding a Sharingan. Humorously, just a couple chapters earlier, Ao, a character from the Mist village, revealed that his eyepatch hides not a Sharingan, but a Byakugan. Since the Byakugan grants X-Ray Vision, he doesn't ever need to take off the eyepatch.
  • In Natsume's Book of Friends, Matoba, head of the notorious Matoba clan, wears a paper seal to protect his right eye. This is because his ancestor's had negotiated the assistance from a Youkai for his right-eye but he never kept up his end of the deal and so vengeful youkai target the head's right-eye. He notes he does have a horrible scar from an ayakashi attack but his eye-patch has yet to be lifted. Realistically though, his depth of perception is poor due to working with only one eye.
  • Neon Genesis Evangelion goes this route with bandages. Rei starts the series with an eyepatch, Asuka ends the movie with one (given that she's thin, likes to wear red, and is German, she should look for work in the next Matsumoto movie).
    • In Evangelion 3.0, Asuka has a more typical pirate-type eyepatch.
  • You'd think One Piece, being a manga about pirates, would be all over this trope. But to date, it has actually averted it, with not a single eyepatch to be seen despite a length of over 1000 chapters. Word of God is that the Eyepatch Of Power is being saved for someone special. Considering how incredibly badass and powerful some of the characters we've already met have been, it can only be wondered what kind of person the eyepatched one will be...
  • In the concealing haircut version of the trope, Xerxes Break of PandoraHearts has bangs that conceal an empty eye socket, accidentally revealed by a young Gil. It is shown later in the series that the eye was plucked out by the Will of the Abyss to replace Cheshire's having encountered the Will of the Abyss due to being dragged into the Abyss after going on a killing spree with his chain.
  • Senri from +Anima uses an eyepatch to control his + anima form.
  • Puella Magi Oriko Magica's Kirika has an eyepatch in her Magical Girl form. This doesn't seem to hamper her fighting ability.
  • Shirow Watari from RahXephon has one. Fitting for the commander of a small army.
  • Itsuki Iba of Rental Magica always wears an eyepatch, though even with it, he still feels a bit of pain when he's around too much magical pollution.
  • André Grandier from The Rose of Versailles has one after losing his left eye rather messily.
  • Barasuishou of Rozen Maiden Träumend wears a flowery eyepatch over her left eye, acting as a seal over her emotions. Kirakishou, the doll she was based on, appears to have an identical one over her right eye, but it was revealed to be an actual rose growing from the socket.
  • Saint Seiya:
    • Somewhat subverted by Dragon Shiryu in . Shiryu either blinds himself or loses his eyesight in the peak moments of his fights, then emerges much more powerful.
    • His companion Cygnus Hyoga wears a more traditional one.
  • Several of the Samurai Gun have these. Losing an eye is apparently an occupational hazard.
  • Toppi of Sands of Destruction wears a patch across his right eye; it isn't stated how he lost it. In one episode, he meets up with an old adventuring buddy named Yappi who also wears one.
  • In The Seven Deadly Sins Helbram in his human form wears an eyepatch on his right eye.
  • Bel Peol, a leader of the villain group Bal Masque from Shakugan no Shana, actually has three eyes, but her normal right eye is covered by an eyepatch. This only makes her look even more badass.
  • In Shura no Toki, two characters use this trope. Takato keeps one eye closed while the legendary Yagyuu Juubei wears a tsuba (sword guard) over one eye. In both cases they have perfectly functional binocular vision but close one eye for the sake of "training". They instantly power up when they use both eyes.
  • In Soul Eater, the Death Scythe Marie Mjolnir has an eyepatch with a lightning bolt on it over her left eye. We're not told what happened for her to need it. In the anime, it is removed during a vision when she uses her special soul wavelength.
  • Professor Anarchy, Speed Racer's adversary in the episode "Gang of Assassins", sports a rather distinctive patch.
  • Fultac from Arakawa's earlier manga Stray Dog also has one hiding a plot-relevant functional eye.
  • Mio Sakamoto of Strike Witches wears a patch over her right (magical) eye. It allows her to see the cores of Neuroi. It should also be noted that this magical eye seems to be always on, meaning the eye patch may also maintain her sanity, if you saw things in magic-o-vision 24/7 you would probably Go Mad From The Revelations.
  • Lag Seeing from Tegami Bachi: Letter Bee has an eye of amber that is usually covered by his hair... unless he is shooting his Heart Gun. It lets him shoot Heart Shots without amber in his gun, and lets him shoot bullets from the palm of his hand too.
    • There are actually several characters in the series who have lost one or both of their eyes, to the point of being a running motif. Others include Dr. Thunderland (one eye) and the twin gatekeepers (both eyes).
  • Adiane in Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. It's bulletproof, too, if the first movie is to be believed.
  • Makiko Nagi of Tenjho Tenge wears one, and it covers a pretty freaky scar. She got it after her lover decided to try creating an ultimate weapon out of someone else and removed the eye in question in order to give his new experimentee the abilities she'd already absorbed from other people.
  • Natose, one of the more powerful characters in They Are My Noble Masters (which is saying something), has an eye patch which is a direct reference to her tragic past.
  • Taken to ridiculous extremes in Tono to Issho OVA with Date Masamune. Just watch first five minutes.
    • The Sengoku Basara version is no slouch, fighting with 6 swords at once when he gets serious.
  • In Tokyo Ghoul, Kaneki Ken wears a medical eyepatch to conceal his oft-uncontrolled Kakugan. After the time skip and his descent into Anti-Hero territory, he starts wearing an eyepatch with a stylized Centipede embroidered on it. His Cool Mask is designed with an eyepatch covering his normal eye, resulting in him gaining the alias "Eyepatch".
    • In the sequel, Tokyo Ghoul: Re, Mutsuki Tooru wears a medical eyepatch for the same reason.
  • Trigun's Dominique the Cyclops has what she calls the Demon Eye. Hidden by a metal shutter over her right eye, the fake eye can temporarily put all who are near in a trance for a few moments.
  • Syaoran's Ultimate Eyepatch Of We're Edgy Now in Tsubasa -RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE-. Which was later passed to Fai after Clone!Syaoran ate Fai's eye and Real!Syaoran escaped from his fishbowl.
  • In Umineko: When They Cry, Siesta 00, the commander of the Siestas (bunny-girl soldiers), has one of these.
  • Lucia Nahashi from Venus Versus Virus wears an eyepatch in order to hide her glowing left eye. It blends in well with her gothic lolita fashion.
  • Thorkell of Vinland Saga has just recently come into possession of an eye patch after losing an eye in a battle. As if he wasn't badass enough already, if this trend continues he'll soon be wearing a long coat regardless of how anachronistic that might be to the period.
  • Wicked Witch of the West in the 1982 anime adaptation of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz wears an eyepatch.
  • Ryuuko Kounuma from Wolf Guy - Wolfen Crest, after her boyfriend beats her up.
  • Lord Darcia III from Wolf's Rain: He uses a patch on his left side to hide the gold-colored wolf's eye which he uses to inexplicably render humans unconscious. It's the result of a family curse and being descended from wolves.
  • Yu-Gi-Oh!,
    • In the original anime, Pegasus' hair almost always covered his Millennium Eye. Usually when it doesn't, it's because he's lifted it out of place. Even after he loses the Millennium Eye, he still covers the place where it was with his hair. He did, however, wear an eyepatch in the (non-canon) card battle video game Yu-Gi-Oh! Reshef of Destruction.
    • One episode in Yu-Gi-Oh! GX featured Don Zaruug/Don Zaloog, a Duel Monster spirit wearing a gold eyepatch that allowed him to manifest in the physical world and bring his fellow "Dark Scorpion" gang members with him. Jim also has bandages constantly covering his magic eye.
  • Fu Inubozaki of Yuki Yuna is a Hero starts wearing an eyepatch after losing the vision of her left eye to the Senju.
  • Irvine from Zoids: Chaotic Century. Though his eyes are completely normal, the eyepatch he wears effectively functions as a combination camera, camcorder, and binoculars.

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  • Age of the Wolf:
    • One of the female leaders of a Neo-Nazi post-apocalyptic gang is wearing a black eyepatch after half her face was burned in a fight against Rowan.
    • By the time she is an old woman, Rowan herself has lost an eye that she covers with a black eyepatch as a result of her repeated fights against werewolves.
  • Blackjak of the second Atari Force series has a cybernetic camera eye plugged into his left eye socket.
  • Barracuda: Blackdog the pirate wears a tattered red silk bandana tied across his missing left eye, which adds to his fearsome appearance.
  • Black Moon Chronicles: Frater Sinister has his eye gouged out by the dragonlord he was allied with when his insurrection against the emperor falls apart, and has to wear a black eyepatch from then on as he openly joins the forces of evil.
  • Cherry Comics: Cherry wears one in her role as Sgt. Cherry in "Sgt. Cherry and her Squealing Commandos".
  • The DCU:
    • Batman: Gordon of Gotham: Robbery Division captain Danzien has a powerful presence and an eyepatch.
    • Batman: Zero Year: The intimidating and unyielding Norwegian queen has an eyepatch as a result of her own initiatory Duel to the Death.
    • In Code Name: Gravedigger, German spy Eric Vonking, a.k.a. 'The Man with the Opened Eye', often wears an eyepatch to conceal his permanently opened blind left eye.
    • The badass assassin Deathstroke wears an eyepatch over his missing eye; his mask is split into two colors, with featureless black over his missing eye, because he's so badass that it doesn't matter if his opponents know he has a physical impairment. In addition, his daughter wears an eyepatch after taking out her own eye in order to prove herself to him.
      • Deathstroke's missing eye is even more badass considering that he lost it when his wife, standing right behind him, tried to shoot him in the back of the head. He heard her cock the gun and dodged. Well mostly. Also keep in mind that his wife was the one who initially trained him as a Special Forces operative, so she knew how to kill someone.
      • Well, except for knowing the proper time to cock a gun. Despite that, she still managed to hit him — and to this day, she's still one of the very, very few people to ever successfully hit him... and out of everybody, she's the one who inflicted the most damage on him.
    • The Action Girl Tallulah Black from Jonah Hex wears an eyepatch on account of her facial scarring from being subject to a Moe Greene Special.
    • Mark Shaw (one of the characters to use the name Manhunter) wore one in his alternative identity of the Privateer. And, no, there was nothing wrong with his eye. He wore it purely because it was cool.
    • The original Lynx, a recurring foe in Robin (1993), after King Snake rips out one of her eyes as punishment for failing to kill Robin.
    • In the Supergirl story Starfire's Revenge, the left eye of the titular villain is covered with a large rhinestone-encrusted black eyepatch which in no way hampers her marskmanship.
    • Deathstroke's daughter Rose, a.k.a. Ravager, gouged out her own eye in an attempt to emulate her father while Brainwashed and Crazy. She would go on to become one of the most badass members of the Teen Titans. And looks smoking hot in her white eyepatch.
    • Wonder Woman:
      • Wonder Woman (1942): The Nazi super-soldier Red Panzer has a scar through one eye which he usually keeps covered as it is no longer funtional.
      • Wonder Woman (1987): The Daxamite wears an eyepatch over her missing eye that does not have a robotic replacement, and she is undeniably an excellent and powerful fighter who commands respect through her insistence on respecting life despite all the horrible things she's gone through. It's a bit of Space Pirate flair for one of the least piratey of Wonder Woman's space pirates.
      • Wonder Woman (2006): Black Canary wears an eyepatch as part of her disguise for infiltrating a superpowered underground fighting ring. It doesn't impede her in the least.
      • Wonder Woman: Odyssey: Philippus lost the use of an eye in the failed fight to defend Themyscira, and as the she was the Amazon's best warrior even before the fall of Themyscira she remains so with the Amazons decimated and the survivors living as refugees.
      • Sensation Comics Featuring Wonder Woman: In "Wonder World", the brash Amazon guard Techne has an eyepatch over her left eye, and a scar running across her forehead slips beneath it at an angle that would hit her eye.
  • The 1980s version of Eagle included a strip titled "One-Eyed Jack". The title character was a Dirty Harry style New York cop who loses an eye in a shootout with some crooks. Returning to the force now sporting an eyepatch, he unleashes high caliber justice on the scum of New York.
  • One-Eye of ElfQuest has a very prominent eyepatch, having lost an eye to humans. In the novelization, Leetah offers to heal it but finds that there's nothing left of the missing eye to heal. In any event, his missing eye turns out to be a liability because when the elves and trolls are fighting, he can't see a troll sneaking up on his blind side and is killed.
  • 8-Ball from El Marvo wears an eye patch and is presumably a respected member of Sokrates' organization, as he's first seen in the comic performing executions in his name.
  • Maj. Bludd has one of these by default in every incarnation of G.I. Joe he appears in, but in the comic, Billy eventually acquires one as well, cementing his status as a badass.
  • Averted by The Goon, who lost the sight in one eye after getting clawed in the face by a dragon. He just pulls his hat down over his eyes.
  • Halo: Blood Line: Spartan-II Black-One has one, though in a variant, it's actually a cybernetic prosthetic that lets her keep seeing despite the loss of her actual eye.
  • Jolly Roger of The Invisibles is an anarchist with a pirate-themed alter-ego and has a closely-shaved head and an eyepatch. Also, she's a lesbian.
  • Juice Squeezers: Coach Kettleborne, the leader of the Juice Squeezers, has an eyepatch. He got it as a kid in the Battle of Valley May Farms. A giant potato bug tried to eat his brain, so he cut its thorax in half and pulled the head out of its eye socket.
  • In Just a Pilgrim, we are introduced to two Eyepatch Badasses. The pilgrim does not have an eyepatch as such, but he did burn out one of his own eyes, leaving a cross-shaped scar across his face. He seems to be the baddest dude on the planet. Till he meets the pirate king, who has TWO eyepatches, TWO hooks for hands, and TWO peg legs. "This be MY killing floor, mate!"
  • Marvel Universe:
    • Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D., started as the hard-charging Sgt. Fury during WWII. But he had two eyes then. The eyepatch gave Fury an older, badass injured look — something the spy gained as a soldier during the war. Since both were running concurrently, Marvel Comics could differentiate the two timelines of the character by use of the patch.
    • Doctor Strange had one for a while as part of a retool into a 'darker' character.
    • Excalibur (Marvel Comics): Pete Wisdom wore an eyepatch, but later revealed that he has full functionality in both eyes and did it just so he could pick up chicks.
    • Odin, father of The Mighty Thor, wears an eyepatch to cover the socket that used to hold the eye that was cast into the Well of Mimir in exchange for wisdom.
    • Warbow in The Saga of Crystar, Crystal Warrior. He lost his eye fighting a wizard and had to be changed to crystal to save his life. The process couldn't restore his eye and he notes that his lack of depth perception makes aiming his bow a bit more difficult.
    • Lampshaded in What The—?!, where every character in the Marvel Universe tries to wear an eyepatch just to be as cool as Wolverine. (See the Invisible Woman wearing nothing but an eye patch!) Wolverine explains that only he can handle the eyepatch as Human Torch slams into the side of a building having misjudged the distance.
    • Wolverine wore an eyepatch for a short time — and went by the name Patch — as a disguise. This worked only as long as you had never met Wolverine before, and/or had never seen him unmasked, since he didn't change anything else about his appearance, including his distinctive hairstyle and facial hair.
    • Female examples from X-Men — Callisto and this Danger Room simulation zombie pirate version of Emma Frost.
  • Spike has acquired one for some reason in the short for issue #4 of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic (IDW), even though both his eyes clearly work fine in the last panel. Perhaps he just felt it looked cool.
  • The Phoney Pages, a 1980s-vintage parody "history" of comic books, included the "cover" of an issue of "Brooke Shields, Agent of F.U.R.Y.", which depicted the title character with two eyepatches — one on each eye.
  • Preacher:
    • Jesse Custer acquires an eyepatch towards the end of the series, after his eye is bitten out by God.
    • The antagonist has a horrible facial scar over one eye, two of the supporting cast were born with only one eye apiece, and a minor villain has two myopic eyes was called Odin, after the one-eyed god. (No, not the one from North of Kathmandu!)
  • Both Edmund Holt and Des of Revival wear one over the left eye to remind readers that they're serving the same role in the story.
  • In Serenity: Those Left Behind, Lawrence Dobson harbors a massive grudge against Mal, who shot his eye out in the Firefly pilot, and as a nifty bonus, he gets a seriously mean-looking cybernetic eye implant grafted onto the side of his head. This goes hand-in-hand with his boosted badassness by that point. Then subverted, as Mal ends up shooting him in the other eye (and a few dozen other places).
  • Gareth the Bowman from Sojourn. Various characters did wonder how someone with no depth perception could be an expert archer. In his narration, Gareth promised that there was an explanation, but the series ended before we could find out what it was.
  • Sonic the Hedgehog (Archie Comics):
    • The Mirror Universe version of Antoine wears one. When Evil Sonic decides to get rid of him by swapping him for the good version, he makes fun of Evil Antoine for only wearing an eyepatch to look cool. Later, when Evil Sonic becomes Scourge, and the king of the mirror universe, he becomes determined to make all the evil counterparts more unique than just mirror versions, including actually cutting out Antoine's eye.
    • Tails' father and Dr. Quack wear these too. Both of them lost one of their eyes in the Great War against the overlanders.
  • Torin Mac Quillon from Starslayer wears an eyepatch that also includes a link to his Robot Buddy SAM.
  • Star Trek (IDW): The Mirror Universe version of Admiral Pike wears one of these, along with some massive scars.
  • In Star Wars (Marvel 1977), our heroes often take disguises involving eyepatches. Luke once dyes his hair red and wears an eyepatch and a beret. In The Big Con, Lando cosplays as a palette-swapped Captain Harlock, choosing this costume in order to play up to the ruffians he's trying to get information from — everything makes him seem more remote and mysterious. At one point, he puts the patch on the wrong side.
  • Future incarnations of Raphael of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles invariably have this.
  • In one of the Wallace & Gromit comics, the villainous Herr Doktor Count Baron Napoleon von Strudel (real name Bert Maudsley) sports an eyepatch to go with his Dastardly Whiplash mustache. He uses the patch to conceal an experimental ping-pong ball that will explode if it touches the ground.
  • Y: The Last Man: Rose Copen is not only an eye-patched modern pirate (though she turns out to be working for the Australian navy), she also manages to explode a depth charge by hitting the primer with a single bullet from an AK-47. When asked how she managed this with no depth perception, the deafened Rose can only reply: "WHAT?"

    Comic Strips 
  • Brenda Starr: Brenda's love interest (and later husband) Basil St. John wears an eyepatch over his left eye, emphasizing his "dashing man of mystery" persona. Basil's sister Anise also wears a patch over her right eye.
  • While he's soft-spoken by nature and aphasic by condition, Leo from Doonesbury does come off as badass at times.
  • Peanuts:
    • Snoopy and his (pretend) crew of "bloodthirsty pirates" wear these. Although the badass quotient decreases when one of his crewbirds tries to double it—and wanders into a post.
    • Sally, during a story arc where she wears an eyepatch to treat 'lazy eye', looks at herself and thinks she should be in an ad for men's shirts. (When her eye got better, she gave it to Snoopy.)
  • A one-page gag in MAD, written and drawn by John Caldwell, features two pirates talking about a third, saying how he is twice as fearsome of a pirate as they will ever be. Said fearsome pirate has two peg legs, two hook arms, two eye patches, and a parrot on both shoulders.
  • In SnarfQuest, Prince Raffendorf wears an eyepatch that would probably be far more dashing had he not suffered a Forced Transformation that transformed him into a humanoid rat.

    Fan Works 
  • HERZ: Asuka wears a patch over her right eye after a spear pierced it during a battle.
  • The Wrong Reflection: Eleya's father Kanril Torvo has a patch over his left eye, said to be a souvenir from the Bajorans' war of liberation from Cardassian rule.
  • In A Very Potter Sequel, the Death Eater Yaxley is inexplicably given one.
  • In the Thomas & Friends fanfic Sodor's Legend of the Lost Treasure Bad Ending, Mitch, a narrow-gauge diesel owned by the Ministry of Defence and stationed at Boulder Quarry, has an eyepatch over his right eye, and Holmes, a Class 08 diesel and member Barrow Union of Diesels who stole four mail vans and threatened to scrap Oliver, is a villainous example with an eyepatch over his left eye.
  • As of chapter 3 part 2 of SilfofinaDragon's Sengoku Basara fanfic Let's Endless Party!, Date Masamune and Sanada Yukimura's son Masa loses his right eye during a fight with the ghost of Toyotomi Hideyoshi, who Masa's Split Personality Sei killed five years earlier, and starts wearing an eyepatch since.
  • The Sea Shadow: Vivian wears an eyepatch to cover her missing eye and is quite the impressive fighter and sailor.
  • Naru-Hina Chronicles: Miho wears one as a result of losing an eye defending her father's sheep herd from wolves at a very young age.

    Films — Animation 

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Dilios, the sole survivor in the film 300. By definition (given his peers) a badass, he is perhaps more so because, with his one eye and his talent for storytelling, he is ordered to do the hard thing (for a Spartan): escape and live, to tell their story.
  • Anne's first mate Dougal sports an eyepatch in Anne of the Indies: only losing it during the final battle just before he dies.
  • Army of Frankensteins: Alan is given one by the war nurses due to Finski removing his eye before the time portal opened.
  • Number Two in Austin Powers: International Man of Mystery neatly takes the second version: hidden in his eyepatch is a sight-enhancing camera, allowing him to cheat at blackjack.
  • In Barbarella, when Barbarella first meets the Black Queen of Sorgo, the Queen is in disguise wearing an eyepatch.
  • In the old cowboy film Black Patch, the title character got the name because he had to wear such a patch after his enemies cut out his eye.
  • Professor Zero from the spy film, The Brain Stealers, wears an eyepatch and is the leader of a powerful SPECTRE-like criminal organization who commands plenty of mooks, and have minions who failed him disposed in an Acid Pool. Turns out to be a subversion when the film's ending reveals Professor Zero to be the heroine's former partner - the eyepatch, scar and cap is just a disguise.
  • In Bring Me the Head of the Machine Gun Woman, Big Bad's Longara's right-hand man Bracoli sports a heavy leather eyepatch. Longara eventually kills him by driving a drinking straw through his good eye.
  • Lord Dread in Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future. Upper-left quarter of his head is cybernetic. His eye is a reg-glowing lens.
  • In Chai Lai Angels: Dangerous Flowers, Darkie, one of Dragon's henchmen, sports one. It is later revealed to be the result of Rose putting his eye out in an earlier encounter.
  • The Russian assassin Morovich in Condorman is prone to wearing an eyepatch. It's usually worn either in place of or to conceal his distinctive false eye, which is entirely silver. he and his team of Elite Mooks are so feared that whenever people hear their fleet of black Porsches approaching they run and hide.
  • Horace's dog Wink wears one in Cruella.
  • Nicole's Gentleman Thief father sports one in Death Walks on High Heels.
  • Major Eden Sinclair in Doomsday. She also has a fake eye, but half the time it's being bounced around and used as a spy camera.
  • Subverted in The Eagle Has Landed. While Colonel Radl does wear a black eyepatch, he is neither particularly evil nor that powerful. He is in fact a calm, empathetic and remotely fatalistic officer.
  • Snake Plissken of Escape from New York and Escape from L.A. fame. Captain Ron ... not so much.
  • The obscure 80s action movie Firewalker had its villain, Coyote, wear one. Although which eye he wore it over changed a few times without explanation...
  • Frankenstein Island: Jocko, one of Sheila Frankenstein's two human henchmen, sports an eyepatch. Whatever is under it is so horrific that Curtis recoils away when shown it.
  • In Friendly Persuasion, the Union Army veteran giving new-to-combat Josh some friendly advice while they lay in wait for Confederate raiders has an eyepatch over one eye.
  • Big Bad Sarris from Galaxy Quest has a metal plate bolted over his damaged right eye after surviving having his ship blown up by atomic mines. He's a sadistic bastard, but that's pretty badass.
  • In Gangs of New York, Bill "the Butcher" Cutting has a glass eye with an iris in the shape of an eagle. He cut his own eye out for flinching from an enemy.
  • Godzilla
  • Patch, the leader of the Howlers motorcycle gang in Goldstone, gets his name from the distinctive eyepatch he wears, which makes him look really badass.
  • Spoofed in The Hebrew Hammer, where a guy has an eyepatch with a Star of David on it. The character is a deliberate parody of real-life Israeli military leader Moshe Dayan, who wore an eyepatch. (See Real Life)
  • The Horse Soldiers: Jackie Jo, one of the pair of Dangerous Deserters captured by Marlowe and his men, wears an eyepatch which adds considerably to his dangerous and desperate air.
  • James Bond
    • Emilio Largo in Thunderball. It helps that he's one of the most charismatic Bond villains ever.
    • Played with the minor villain Gettler in Casino Royale (2006), who wears glasses that have one lens darkened.
  • Dark Action Girl and Evil Counterpart of the protagonist, Elle Driver from Kill Bill has one due to getting her eye plucked out by Hermit Guru Pai Mei prior to the film. Tarantino got the idea from a '70s exploitation film (no surprise there) called Thriller: A Cruel Picture, about an eyepatch-wearing prostitute going on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge. Unfortunately for Driver, getting her remaining eye plucked out makes her defenseless.
  • Kingsman: The Golden Circle explores the downsides of this trope. The character wearing the eyepatch (and later, a pair of glasses with one black lens) was established as a highly trained One-Man Army before the event that cost him his eye. Sadly, without proper depth perception, he now struggles to aim his shots properly, and in his first fight since that event, he is caught completely off guard by an attack from his blind side. He gets better over the course of the story and seems capable enough in the final fights, but the failures early on are shown to put quite a damper on his confidence.
  • Benedict, the Big Bad in Last Action Hero, has a collection of unique glass eyes, most of which have special functions, like explosives.
  • Long John Silver: As might be guessed from his name, Silver's first mate Patch sports an eyepatch.
  • Several examples in the Marvel Cinematic Universe:
    • A Thor example: As in mythology and the comic books, Odin has one eye. What sets him apart in this adaptation is his choice of eyegear. He has a regular eyepatch and an armored eyepatch for battle. Verily.
    • Nick Fury in all his film appearances. In Captain America: The Winter Soldier Fury even weaponizes this trope by storing the retinal data for his bad eye in the S.H.I.E.L.D. systems in case his primary clearance is revoked.
    • By the end of Thor: Ragnarok, Thor loses an eye and gains one of these. Though in his next appearance he gets a Electronic Eye from Rocket, which isn't the same color as the remaining one.
  • In The Mummy Returns, the character Izzy is first seen wearing an eyepatch. Subverted when he openly admits that he wears it to look good; Rick pulls it off afterward.
  • The aptly named Kid Blink from Newsies.
  • Wilhelm in None Shall Escape briefly uses an eyepatch after losing his left eye before getting a Glass Eye instead.
  • "Big" Dan Teague from O Brother, Where Art Thou? wears an eyepatch when he is introduced, and a one-eyed Ku Klux Klan hood later. This is a Shout-Out to the Cyclops and the Greek mythology underpinning the story.
  • Towards the end of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End, Ragetti (a Plucky Comic Relief character) gives up his wooden eye for an eyepatch since it turned out his wooden eye was one of the pieces of eight of the Pirate Lords. He doesn't really become more badass, but it does mark a shift into a more serious tone of the film.
  • Willy T, the weird but surprisingly perceptive and cultured gas station attendant in Psycho Pike wears an eyepatch over his right eye, which was bitten off by a ferocious pike.
  • Holmes wears one as part of his disguise to infiltrate Moriarty's gang in Sherlock Holmes and the Deadly Necklace.
  • Johnny Five dons an eyepatch of sorts it's actually his nonfunctional eye being held in place and covered by electrical tape during the third act of Short Circuit 2. Its reveal marks a second mood shift in the film and begins his Roaring Rampage of Revenge.
  • In Six Gun Savior, the outlaw Grant Dillion, the object of Lane's obsession and the major human villain of the film, sports an eye-patch.
  • Franky, Angelina Jolie's character in Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2004).
  • General Chang in Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country doesn't wear an eyepatch—he's such a badass that he actually has a metal plate riveted to his face.
  • Captain Typho, who replaces Captain Panaka in between Episodes I and II of the Star Wars prequels as the head of Amidala's guard. Some viewers mistook Typho for a recast Panaka with battle damage.
  • Many of the publicity photos and posters for the Terminator movies show Arnie with one human-like eye and one glowing red machine eye, showing the bad-assedness of having one normal eye and one weird high-tech eye.
  • Christopher Lee wore an eyepatch for his role as Rochefort in The Three Musketeers (1973), to make him more sinister, and this appearance detail has carried over to a lot of other adaptations.
  • Rooster Cogburn, John Wayne's (or Jeff Bridges') anti-hero from True Grit. Though the Rooster in the 2010 film is still an excellent shot with one eye, the film points out his difficulty aiming, and it's why he accidentally hits LaBoeuf in the arm during a shootout. After this role brought John Wayne the Academy Award for Best Actor, he said: "If I'd known this, I'd have put that eyepatch on 40 years ago."
  • In True Lies, Charlton Heston makes a cameo as the boss of Ahnuld's character. He sports one of these, as well as several gold teeth.
  • Inspector Kemp from Young Frankenstein sports one of these, along with a wooden arm (either the left or the right depending on context and funniness) and monocle (on the same eye as the eyepatch).

    Literature 
  • Heaven Official’s Blessing: Tian Guan Ci Fu: Hua Cheng is a very powerful Ghost King and one of the Four Calamities, and he wears an eyepatch almost all the time.
  • Donar Vadderung in The Dresden Files has one of these, as well an incredible amount of power. Unsurprising, since he's Odin.
  • Lampshaded with jollity in Garth Nix's Keys to the Kingdom series, in which Arthur encounters a band of savage looking sailors. When it's revealed that their appearances are all for show, one of them insists that he can not only have one but two eyepatches, if one-way leather is used.
  • Percy Jackson and the Olympians: When he is introduced in Battle of the Labyrinth, Ethan Nakamura has already made a deal with his godly mother, Nemesis, and sacrificed one eye in order to become more powerful. He is the one to find Percy's Achilles' Heel (literally) and even his own conscience when he turns against Kronos in the last minute.
  • Professor Mad Eye Moody in the Harry Potter books has a magical glass eye, which is not only intimidating and can see in any direction, but also penetrates solid objects and illusions.
  • Ryan Cawdor of the Deathlands novels has one. He is an exceptional shot with a gun, but in conversation the characters note that this is rather unusual and indicative of his marksmanship talents.
  • Discworld:
    • Mr. Teatime in Hogfather is a sociopathic and highly-skilled assassin with one good eye. Many characters in the book think his glass eye (which is blank and rumored to be made from the same glass used for crystal balls) isn't nearly as scary as his good eye (which has an unnervingly narrow pupil). Of course, considering that Discworld magic is more than a little unstable, it proves how insane he is if he put a magic prosthetic in his eye socket.
    • Posthumous Character John Keel in Night Watchthe guy who taught Sam Vimes everything he knows. Vimes has to act briefly as his one-eyed mentor to establish a Stable Time Loop—however, he's no more badass than he normally is, which is still pretty damn badass.
  • Forest Kingdom: In the Hawk & Fisher spinoff series, Hawk has an eyepatch over one eye, as well as several scars along his face. Unusually enough, he does have depth perception problems, at least to the point where he prefers to fight with a short-handled axe rather than a sword. He's almost over-the-top in levels of 'experienced badass combatant', though, even with this handicap. The truth isn't revealed (both in-universe and to readers) until the parent series' book 4 (Beyond the Blue Moon), when it comes out that Hawk is actually Prince Rupert from the parent series' book 1 (Blue Moon Rising), who lost the eye in battle against a Big Bad.
  • Forgotten Realms antagonist/antihero Jarlaxle has two good eyes, but sports a magical eyepatch with powers including X-ray vision and protection against psionics, depending on which eye the patch covers. Jarlaxle leads a prestigious mercenary company and is something of a Magnificent Bastard, glorying in chaos and favored by the drow's evil spider goddess.
  • Honor Harrington wore an eyepatch in one book after her left eye was damaged before she had it replaced with a cybernetic eye (with telescopic vision). Later, she also acquired a synthetic arm.
  • Captain William Fredrickson from the Sharpe series is missing an eye (and his two front teeth). When he enters combat, he removes his eyepatch and false teeth to frighten the enemy.
  • Euron Greyjoy from A Song of Ice and Fire. Called the Crow's Eye, Euron is a vicious Magnificent Bastard with serious issues. His brother Aeron, describes Euron's uncovered eye as his "smiling eye" and makes vague, fearful references to what he hides beneath the patch. He is the captain of the ship "Silence", whose crew is made of mutes and its hull painted red with the blood of Euron's enemies, and it is said that men pray whenever they see his sails.
  • Corum in Michael Moorcock's novels is given the Eye of the missing god Rhynn to replace his lost eye. This allows him to see into—and summon the assistance of creatures from—other realms whenever he raises his jeweled eyepatch. Later on, he has to give (the no-longer missing) Rhynn his eye back, and thereafter wears a conventional eyepatch.
  • The Wheel of Time
    • Uno is introduced with just one eye, later on he starts wearing an eyepatch with a scary eye painted on it. While he IS a badass he more of a drill sergeant.
    • Mat Cauthon loses an eye, too, and he actually notes his lack of depth perception and worsened sight, but he decides it isn't so bad. After all,he needed to trade it with Eldritch Abominations shaped as Snakes, who you can only way to survive the Evil Tower of Ominousness, which a children's game is base off of, because All Myths Are True. "Luck worked better when you were not looking anyway."
  • The Divine Fratery of Dan Abnett's novel Ravenor Returned are an organization that dedicates their efforts to ruining the Imperium by scrying out possible futures and working to manifest the ones that would do the most harm. In order to become a full member, the supplicant must put out one of their own eyes and receive no medical treatment for any reason until they have completed fashioning the silver mirror they will use to divine the future. Constructing the mirror can take years. Those who are successful are given an augmented eye to replace the one they sacrificed, and henceforth hide their remaining real eye behind an eye patch when not actively scrying.
  • Star Wars Legends:
    • There are three people in the X-Wing Series who each have a mechanical eye—Booster Terrick, General Edor Crespin, and Ton Phanan. Booster and Phanan each have a glowing red prosthesis. When Phanan dies staring at the stars and someone closes his real eye, his mechanical one stays powered, not dimming. Crespin is said to have got a glossy black prosthetic, but because people found it unnerving he wore a mirrored patch over it. Wedge suspects that he can see through it.
    • Baron Soontir Fel acquires an eye patch. When asked why he never replaced it with a prosthetic, he says that the resources can be better used elsewhere and that he's still the best damn pilot in the Empire of the Hand.
    • Star Wars: Kenobi: Tusken Raiders always go masked anyway, but A'Yark only has the use of one eye, so she's jammed a reddish gemstone into the other eyepiece.
  • Friday by Robert A. Heinlein. Friday's unnamed Boss refuses to have his eye regenerated, and so wears an 'unfashionable' eyepatch.
  • In the Mageworlds series by Debra Doyle and James D. MacDonald, the heroine Beka Metadi assumes the identity of the roguish (and male) Tarnikep Portee, a nearly psychotic dandy with a crimson eyepatch and an oversized blaster. Tarnikep is both crazier and more of a badass that Beka.
  • Romance of the Three Kingdoms: Xiahou Dun earns his Eyepatch of Power by getting hit in the eye with an arrow. Unfazed, he plucks out the arrow, eats his own eye, and returns to the fight.
  • Tales of the Sundered Lands: One-Eyed Ryan, as his name suggests, has only one eye. He is also very experienced.
  • The Hereward Trilogy: Lysir, who may actually BE Odin.
  • The Wicked Witch of the West wears one in the original The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
  • Major ____ de Coverley wears one in Catch-22. His face is so forbidding that no one dares ask his first name. It turns out that his eyepatch was not gained during any battlefield heroics. An ornery old man tossed a rose in the Major's eye for being so damn imperious.
  • Mrs. Arthur B. Candy in Flashman and the Redskins, from the “Seventy-Sixer” half of the book, wears an eyepatch. Flashy doesn't care why she has it, as he finds it smoking hot, along with her. To his sorrow, he later finds out that she's actually the ex-slave Cleonie, and is wearing the patch to hide the shape of her face so she can fool him, seduce him, and lure him to his doom as revenge for the evil he did to her in the “Forty-Niner” half of the book.
  • In Expecting Someone Taller (a very loose, comic sequel to the famous opera, The Ring of the Nibelung), Wotan, the king of the gods, wears one, just as he does in the opera. It's very intimidating.
  • Bagley Brown Jr., the lead character in the children's novel The Wainscott Weasel, sports an eyepatch as the result of losing an eye to a bird attack when he was a child. His troubles with depth perception are accurately mentioned, and he definitely meets his badass quota by doing most of the work in hauling off an osprey's nest from the top of a telephone pole.
  • In Changeling by Roger Zelazny, when Mark Marakson is slowly becoming a dark lord of high technology in a world of magic, one of the first things he gets is an implant in his left eye. With a lens that buzzes and changes color adapting to illuminance.
  • In The Shattered Kingdoms, the mercenary known as the Mongrel has an eyepatch, but she isn't missing an eye. Rather, her two eyes work differently from each other as a result of her supernatural illness (which applies a sort of Duality Motif to her). Both eyes work, but they don't work well together, and she actually sees better if she only uses one at a time.
  • In Another, Mei Misaki wears an eyepatch that covers an artificial eye that replaces the one she lost to cancer. She can see the "color of death" with said "eye".
  • Jurand in The Knights of the Cross, of an experienced combatant variety (also, badass). Later on he loses the other eye, along with some other body parts, thanks to the vengeful villains.
  • The sorcerer Peredur in The Dragon Waiting.
  • Jerry Ahern (aka Axel Kilgore) wrote an Action-Adventure series They Call Me The Mercenary. The title character Hank Frost wore an eyepatch, and a Running Gag involved him providing a different and highly implausible explanation every time someone asked how he lost his eye.
  • In the ebook Lockhartand Teague:The Empty Chest Allegra Stroud is a powerful and imposing character who has a glass eye. It's implied that she had it made a slightly lighter shade than her other, real eye just to screw with people.
  • Polly in Quicksand House spends most of the story wearing an improvised eyepatch made from a doll's face. Hence why the picture on the book's cover is of a green-haired girl with antlers and a doll's-face eyepatch, giving you a good idea of what to expect.
  • Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians: The Big Bad of the first book is Blackburn, who Invoked this trope. In their world, magic has to do with lenses (magic glasses) and he put out one of his own eyes in order to concentrate all his power through the one eye. It works, in that it makes him a more powerful Oculator, but it also handicaps him and makes him short-sighted.
    Bastille: He's a very powerful Oculator, Alcatraz — they say he put out his own eye to increase the power focused through his single remaining one.
  • In Raise Some Hell Ramona herself gets one after her eye is hit by a piece of flaming wood. It's burned to the point that even the school nurse can't regenerate it, though they can make sure it won't act up.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Michael "Archangel" Coldsmith-Briggs, CIA agent and Mission Control for Airwolf, loses an eye during the Grand Theft Prototype of the eponymous helicopter in the Pilot Movie. He wears a medical eyepatch at first, then for the rest of the series wears spectacles with one opaque black lens, in a variation on the trope.
  • In Arrow, Slade Wilson wears an eyepiece that restores and enhances vision in the present-day timeline, having lost his right eye sometime in the past due to having an arrow stabbed through his eye by Oliver.
  • Babylon 5: G'Kar is badass even before losing the eye, but gets downright messianic afterward. Also, his eye is part of a prophecy involving Londo — "saving the eye that does not see" is one of three actions that would save Londo from bad, bad things. He doesn't. Then the Drakh put a Keeper on him.
  • Saul Tigh from Battlestar Galactica (2003), as of the third season. He's always been somewhat of a Psycho Supporter, almost a Manipulative Bastard, but perhaps not coincidentally, he becomes a significantly more formidable character at more or less the exact same point at which he loses his eye. In what may count as a subversion, Tigh forgoes a classic black eyepatch for a distinctly more medical flesh-colored patch with transparent cords. Moreover, he spends several episodes beforehand with a very uncool chunk of gauze taped to his face. It's also worthy of note that there was an episode where he was having a great deal of difficulty putting his "uncool chunk of gauze" on by himself, subverting the "no loss of depth perception" addendum above.
  • Space Commander Travis in Blake's 7 has a skin-like eye patch large enough for the Two-Faced trope to also apply. It's an injury inflicted by Blake in their Backstory, along with the damaged arm that's been converted into an Arm Cannon.
  • Tom Croydon of Blue Heelers first has a bandage, then a medical patch after the station bombing. He's implied to kill two criminals, threatens the jobs of those around him, alienates everyone who knows him and becomes a thug for the better part of the rest of the series.
  • The Boys (2019): In the season 3 finale, Maeve loses an eye fighting Homelander. Before she goes into exile with her girlfriend, eye still only covered in gauze, she asks whether to get an eyepatch or a glass eye. The girlfriend replies the first, certainly very aware of this trope.
  • Xander from Buffy the Vampire Slayer gets considerably more badass after Caleb takes out his eye during Season 7. This too subverts the "no lost depth perception" by having him state that he now has to renew his driver's license every year, due to his loss in depth perception.
  • Colonel March sports one in Colonel March of Scotland Yard.
  • One episode of Combat! (1962), "Odyssey", has Sgt. Saunders pretending to a shell-shocked German soldier named "Corporal Ernst Keller". Everyone buys the act, except for two characters: one is a particularly observant and highly decorated German orderly (the other is a German lieutenant later on). In an apparently intentional allusion to Polyphemus from The Odyssey, the orderly wears an eyepatch and does his best to "sniff out" Germans who are feigning their injuries, and Saunders has to continually outwit him.
  • The magnificent Catalina Creel from Cuna de lobos, Evil Matriarch who uses her eyepatch to inflict guilt over her unfavourite son for the accident who left her blind on that eye. She also overdoes every telenovela villain ever. Her eyepatch is so vital to her that the first murder we see she does, in the very first chapter, is her husband's, because he discovered that the eye under that patch is healthy, and he wanted to uncover the truth.
  • One of the most popular characters in Days of Our Lives in the late 1980s was Steve 'Patch' Johnson who (in his backstory) had lost an eye in a fight with the show's main hero Bo Brady and wore a patch. Steve's initial storylines included terrorizing Bo and his wife Hope but after a Heel–Face Turn, Steve reconciled with Bo and eventually married Bo's sister after taking over from Bo as the show's main hero when Bo was put on a sailing ship.
  • Doctor Who:
    • The evil version of the Brigadier wears an eyepatch in "Inferno" — and as we all know, Evil is Badass, so therefore, this counts as a variation on this trope. This example may have started the trend of evil Alternate Universe versions of characters depicted with eyepatches.
    • Madam Kovarian from the 2011 series has some kind of cybernetic device over her right eye. A bunch of other characters start wearing copies of it in "The Wedding of River Song". The Doctor notes that all the servants of the Silence wear them, and as such is horrified when he sees Amy wearing one. She however is not Brainwashed and Crazy and notes that it is not an eyepatch, it lets them remember the Silents, which is why both their servants and those fighting them (like Amy's group) wear them. The eyepatches also act as kill-devices that electrocute their wearers to death once the Silence have no further use for them, as Kovarian learns the painful way when Amy forces hers back on.
  • Subverted in Flight of the Conchords: David Bowie appears to Bret in a dream and tells him that he'd become more famous as a musician if he started wearing an eyepatch. Bret wears one for a while but stops after he complains about his poor depth perception causing him to miss chairs and run into walls. In his next dream, Bret tells Bowie what happened, and he admits he had similar problems when he wore one (see Music below).
  • In Kamen Rider Decade, the alternate Kamen Rider TheBee has one. He lost his eye to Souji.
  • Mikhail from Lost. The man survives many injuries (such a sonic fence-induced brain hemorrhage and being shot in the chest with a harpoon) relatively unscathed. It took the Word of God to convince fans that he could die.
  • In Mad Men, after an incident while hunting with clients in Detroit, Ken Cosgrove wounds his right eye and is forced to wear an eyepatch.
  • The Middleman: In the alternate universe shown in "The Palindrome Reversal Palindrome", the alternate Middleman sports an Eyepatch of Power and is a Badass Biker to boot.
  • Midsomer Murders: In "The Night of the Stag", local beekeeper and resident Cool Old Guy Byron Street has this. He is the only person in the valley not afraid of Samuel Quested and shows up wielding a shotgun in a Big Damn Heroes moment to save Barnaby and Jones from being lynched by an angry mob.
  • Motherland: Fort Salem: Abigail's bodyguard Bridey has an eyepatch, a reminder of her failure to save her sister.
  • MythBusters did a segment exploring the story that a pirate captain wore an unnecessary eyepatch so that they could go above and below decks without losing their night-vision, as the eye covered would already be dark-acclimated. Their tests showed that switching an eyepatch from one eye to the other in a darkened room made navigating an obstacle course significantly easier.
  • In NCIS, Trent Kort seems quite unfazed and even more driven ever since losing an eye to the Port-to-Port Killer and wearing a metallic eye patch. He even seems to enjoy the menacing look it gives him.
  • NTSF:SD:SUV::: Kove wears an eyepatch, given that she's a female Nick Fury spoof.
  • The Outer Limits (1995): Subverted in "The Light Brigade", in which the Chief Weapons Officer on a spaceship has an eyepatch like you might expect of a badass combat veteran, but when we see the Weapons Room everyone there has the same patch, which is revealed to cover an ocular implant for a Brain/Computer Interface.
  • Lily Charles of Pushing Daisies is missing an eye due to an incident while cleaning cat litter and is definitely bad-ass, blowing her erstwhile assassin out the window with her shotgun after he thought her choked to death. Her lack of an eye is dealt with realistically, if a bit comedically, in that she misses the fact that Chuck, her niece/daughter, is back from the dead despite Chuck standing right in front of her. You see, Chuck just happened to be in her blind-spot at the time...
  • In one episode of Seinfeld, Kramer sees a cop wearing an eyepatch and, thinking it looks cool, decides to start wearing one as well. His trademark klutziness exacerbates thanks to his now-limited field of vision, but he doesn't seem to care.
    Jerry: You look like a pirate!
    Kramer: I want to be a pirate!
  • A Song of Ice and Fire:
    • Game of Thrones: Beric Dondarrion wears one after "surviving" a dagger in the eye.
    • House of the Dragon: Aemond Targaryen wears one after the childhood brawl against his Velaryon nephews over his claiming of Vhagar that cost him an eye. He grew up a fearsome swordsman regardless.
  • In the Spin City episode "Grand Illusion", bumbling press secretary Paul Lassiter is forced to wear an eyepatch for several days because of an accident with his new toaster. Almost immediately, it starts taking effect: Women start finding him attractive, he's able to hold his own with the people who insult him, he makes sure the press have no questions at all and is even able to order his boss around a little. At the end of the episode, he decides he doesn't need the eyepatch in order to be confident and pitches it. Needless to say, it doesn't go as planned, and he ends up trying to find it again.
  • Star Trek:
    • General Martok of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine is already badass as a Klingon. Add to that the removal of his eye, the scar tissue that covered up the socket in a natural eye patch, and his becoming the winningest Klingon commander of the war and eventually the new Chancellor, and you have a true badass. On top of all that, in the Expanded Universe, he becomes the Klingon King Arthur!
    • Humorously subverted in the Star Trek: Voyager episode "False Profits". While Paris and Chakotay visit an alien planet, they're approached by a 'prophet' (read: con man) who gives interpretations of sacred legends for a 'small fee'. This all works very well (though neither of them are actually fooled), until Paris dryly points out that his eyepatch was on the other eye the last time they spoke with him. Said con man then switches the patch to the 'correct' eye right in front of them and holds out his hand for payment.
  • Parodied in the Supernatural episode "Pac-Man Fever". Charlie Bradbury is in a Lotus-Eater Machine where she's a video game Action Girl. When she first appears, she's wearing an entirely unnecessary eyepatch that she removes after her Big Damn Heroes.
  • In Tensou Sentai Goseiger, the Seaick form of the Humongous Mecha Gosei Great has a literal Eyepatch of Power; it not only adds to the pirate look of the mecha, it allows it to detect and target enemies.
  • In Twin Peaks, Nadine Hurley wears an eyepatch over her left eye after losing it in a hunting accident on her and her husband Ed's honeymoon. At the beginning of the second season, after attempting suicide, she not only loses her memory but also gains Super-Strength. In fact, she's so strong, she accidentally pulls a door off its hinges.
  • A villainous example from The Walking Dead (2010): The Governor, though already established as a very dangerous man, eventually dons an eyepatch after Michonne gauges out his eye with a piece of broken glass, though unlike most examples it does take a few episodes before he puts on the actual eyepatch, though the bandages he wears in that time could still count.
  • Subverted in Wizards of Waverly Place during the Harry Potter spoof school for magic (where everyone must wear a bathrobe over their clothes and a pair of glasses just like Harry's to accessorize the bathrobes) the rude upperclassman who acts as Justin's rival wears an Eyepatch over a functioning eye, not to make himself better but just to get out of wearing the dorky glasses.
  • Richard "Yin Yang Man" Branden in WMAC Masters wears an eye patch with a yin yang symbol on it. However, his is legitimately blind in that eye, and sometimes during exhibitions, he would actually use a Glass Eye with the symbol on it instead.
  • In the original television airings of The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles, there were segments set in the present day (the then present, around 1992). These bits featured an elderly Indiana Jones, who wore an eyepatch over his right eye, and a pair of glasses over the patch. He also had a nasty facial scar trailing out from under his eyepatch. However, these 1990s scenes were all deleted in later airings of the show, and still haven't become available on home video. A time skip was involved here, because Indy still has both eyes in all the films so far (which cover events up to 1957, and when the Chronicles first aired extended only to 1938).
  • A cutaway sketch in The Young Ones involves a literal pirate radio DJ wearing an eyepatch. The trouble with that is, he's a cyclops. When his parrot shouts out insults he thinks the cabin boy's doing it.
  • Arturo Peniche's character, Governor Fernando Sánchez de Moncada, from the telenovela El Zorro, la espada y la rosa (Zorro: The Sword and the Rose). He's the father of the antagonistic sisters Esmeralda and Mariangel, both interested in the main character, and wears a nice black eyepatch.

    Music 
  • Following a childhood accident that left his left eye blind, British-American rapper Slick Rick is always seen with it as an Iconic Outfit.
  • Kansas guitarist Rich Williams, who lost an eye to a childhood fireworks accident. He used to have a glass eye, but now goes for this trope.
  • Country singer Dick Curless covered a bad right eye with his trademark patch.
  • Ray Sawyer of Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show has worn one ever since losing an eye in a car crash.
  • When David Bowie made a Dutch television appearance to promote his then-new album Diamond Dogs, his right eye was affected with pinkeye and he thus wore an eyepatch for the duration of it. The eyepatch was cool enough that his whole outfit became tied to the character of Halloween Jack (from the album's title track) for fans, despite him not wearing anything similar to it on the subsequent Diamond Dogs Tour. (His performance of "Rebel Rebel" from this show appears on the Best of Bowie DVD set.)
  • When The Who performed Quadrophenia at London's Hyde Park in 1996, lead singer Roger Daltrey wore a red, white and blue eyepatch after he got hit in the eye by Gary Glitter's mike stand during rehearsals.
  • Bushwick Bill of Geto Boys fame has sported one ever since a 1991 incident when he goaded his girlfriend into shooting him in the face. While holding their kid out a window. No, really.

    Music Videos 
  • The music video for They Might Be Giants' song "Hollywood House of Blues" involves an innovative alternative rock band called The Lads, whose lead singer wears an eyepatch. The eyepatch is also key to the greater success of Lads rip-off band The Blokes.
  • Pete Burns from Dead or Alive wore a spiffy black eyepatch in the video for "You Spin Me Right Round".

    Myths & Religion 
  • Odin, the chief god in Norse Mythology, is said to have plucked out an eye to gain wisdom from a magic well. Personal sacrifice to gain knowledge is actually a recurring theme for him.

    Podcasts 
  • The Adventure Zone: Balance Merle receives one after giving up his left eye in "The Suffering Game".
  • In Mission to Zyxx Pleck tries one out to look cool. He adopts it full-time after his eyeball hatches.
  • In the Relative Disasters episode on the Roman invasion of Kush, Queen Amanirenas loses an eye in battle and continues to personally lead her army, though it's unclear whether or not she has a literal eyepatch.

    Pro Wrestling 
  • Pirata Morgan took up a pirate gimmick after he lost an eye during a match. He usually wears a mask with only one eye hole rather than a patch but he has worn those too.
  • Rocky Romero takes to an eye patch when teaming with Alex Koslov as Forever Hooligans.
  • Bryan Danielson wore an eye patch after Takeshi Morishima punched him in the face and detached his retina.
  • Jimmy Jacobs took up an eye patch after his own spike was turned on him by Delirious, so he wouldn't miss the rest of Ring of Honor's early 2009 Canada tour.
  • Leva Bates as Nick Fury: Agent Of Shield.
  • Wonder Ring Stardom's Act Yasukawa wears an eye patch, partially due to being blind in one eye, though she can function without it. More importantly, she's from the same area as "the one-eyed dragon" Date Masamune, who also wore a patch.
  • Naomi Knight after having her orbital bone broken by Aksana.
  • Jon Moxley wore one after being stabbed in the eye by then-current All Elite Wrestling champion Chris Jericho. He wore it for weeks, before pulling it off to reveal his eye was healed during his match against Jericho for the championship, using the surprise to pin Jericho and become AEW champion himself.

    Roleplay 
  • Paul Smith of Survival of the Fittest has an eyepatch, having lost one eye after a freak barbecue accident (no, seriously). He is shown to be a more than competent fighter, being (as of the end of the 2007 school year) the second-best fighter in the school and certainly something of a badass.
  • Tom from Ruby Quest has his right eye ripped out early on; he's left with an empty socket until he and Ruby find some gauze and bandages to make an eyepatch. Eventually, this is augmented with a "DO NOT OPEN" label. In this case it only serves as an apropos emblem of his supreme badassery, as his MANLY PHYSIQUE and inclination towards smashing things prove valuable assets throughout the course of the story.
  • El Cid Campeador from Fate/Nuovo Guerra sports an eyepatch, and some facial scarring to boot. He also happens to be the national hero of Spain, and a heroic spirit capable of superhuman feats.
  • Equestria Chronicles: Behold Fidelity, badass pegasus guard, though outside guard situations she's not that good.

    Tabletop Games 
  • In Deadlands, one of the canon NPCs is a grizzled veteran of a dozen wars and conflicts with the supernatural who sports just such an eyepatch. The story goes like this: Hank Ketchum was laying in the surgeon's tent at the Battle of Gettysburg when his surgeon-to-be snapped. He had already lopped body parts off of a few other men before gouging out Ketchum's eye with a scalpel. What did the gruff Texan do? He chased the surgeon away, presumably with violence real and threatened. And that's why they call him One-Eye.
    • Based off the John Wayne character Rooster Cogburn (see Movies above.)
  • There's a magic item in one Dungeons & Dragons sourcebook called the Corsair's Eyepatch, which is transparent to the wearer so as not to impede vision. Depending on which eye it's worn over, the wearer can activate it to See Invisible, or gain the Blind Fight feat.
    • And don't forget the Eye of Vecna. A cursed relic of an infamous arch-mage that requires the user to put out one of their own eyes and place the Eye of Vecna in the empty socket.
    • Forgotten Realms has a lot of unusual magical items, including eyepatches such as the one worn by Jarlaxle (see above) and eyepatch of shooting stars.
  • Warhammer 40,000:
    • Kommissar Yarrick replaced a missing eye with a bionic implant that could fire a laser in order to live up to Ork stories that he could kill with a glance.
    • "Lord Prince" Yriel, an Eldar corsair turned High Admiral of Iyanden whose Eye of Wrath can blast everything around him once per game.
    • All Navigators wear coverings of some sort over their third eye when not guiding a ship through the Warp, because eye contact with a Navigator's third eye is fatal.
  • BattleTech:
    • Susie "One-Eyed" Morgaine-Ryan was one of the few surviving Bandit Kingdom leaders after the coming of the Clans wiped out almost all of the bandits in their path. That she not only survived but kept her unit intact and captured some Clan Omnimechs speaks volumes about her credentials. Naturally, she looks and acts the part of a pirate queen.
    • Anastasius Focht is never seen without an eyepatch, and though he's at least 50 years old by the time he shows up, he is both an accomplished Battlemech pilot and a strategic genius who turned back the Clans at Tukayyid. To beat one Clan is already a feat. To beat six out of the seven invading Clans on their own terms is pretty impressive. Focht is really Frederick Steiner of House Steiner, a disgraced minor scion who was found to be plotting treachery and was given the chance to make one last heroic stand against his nation's enemies instead. Instead of dying, he was shot in the side of the head—costing him an eye, but, as he notes, granting him new insight and maturity concerning the nature of politics and people.
  • Zigzags for GURPS, at least for some editions. "One Eye" disadvantage normally gives -1 reaction roll, but "If you have Charisma, or are Handsome or Very Handsome, the patch just looks romantic, and does not affect reaction rolls."

    Theatre 

    Toys 
  • Big Barda is re-imagined as a space pirate with an Eyepatch Of Power in the Ame-Comi Girls line of PVC statues from DC Direct.

    Video Games 
  • Dalton from Chrono Trigger, one of the villains in 12,000 B.C. He may not seem to fit the "of Power" part of the trope, being a arrogant blowhard who prefers for golems to do his fighting for him, but Chrono Trigger DS proved him to be a Not-So-Harmless Villain.
  • In Dicey Dungeons, the Thief wears an eyepatch on his left eye, adding to his "rogue thief" aesthetic.
  • Kano from Mortal Kombat had a red cyber-eye in a metal plate. Ironically, he's a bit of a jobber.
  • Sagat from Street Fighter has an eyepatch, and embodies this trope to quite an extent.
    • Juri Han wears one in Street Fighter V when Bison rips out her cybernetic eye. She gets a replacement, but it doesn't look like a human eye, so she hides it with the eyepatch until she wants to use it.
  • Soul Series:
    • Zasalamel from Soul Calibur 3 has a golden left eye, which is rumored to contain his immortal soul.
    • In the Korean versions, Mitsurugi (a samurai) is replaced by a blonde English man with an eyepatch called Arthur. This allowed the makers to keep Mitsurugi's moveset in the game without offending the Korean players.
  • Heidern, Mature (in KoFXII/XIII only) and Ramon from The King of Fighters.
    • Badass Rugal Bernstein, rocking the glowing red eye version. Double points for having lost that eye to the next game boss Goenitz back when both were younger. For worse, he is the reason why Heidern is wearing his own 'patch... and why he lost his first unit and his family.
    • And in the case of Mature, the eyepatch is actually a Power Limiter. If she takes it off, it's a clue that she's about to unleash a world of PAIN on you with the strongest super move she's got.
  • Xenogears gives us not one, but two examples of this trope. Bartholomew Fatima, the ousted desert pirate prince of Aveh, and Sigurd, the Ambiguously Brown Pretty Boy who is Bart's brother with his eyepatch on the opposite eye. This becomes a plot point later in the game.
  • Xenoblade Chronicles 2:
    • Zeke, who wears an eyepatch emblazoned with a turtle. He claims it conceals his "Eye of Shining Justice", which supposedly has enough power to reduce men to ash, but if his Blade Pandoria is to be believed, he just wears it because he was too poor to afford a contact lenses for a bad eye. A multitude of his battle poses have him with a hand in front of said eye as though he's channeling power from it. However, the addition of New Game Plus would reveal that the Eye of Shining Justice was Real After All. Working in a similar fashion to invoking Pnuema, the Eye will give Zeke and Pandoria a major speed and power boost. The right set-up could even kill the strongest superboss with ease.
    • The Blades Praxis and Theory also wear an eyepatch; in post-battle banter, Zeke will accuse Praxis of "infringing" on his "copyright." Praxis retorts that she has an actual condition, so if anything he should lose his eyepatch.
  • Vandham and his crew in Xenoblade Chronicles 3 bore eyepatches when he first encountered the six soldiers that he would empower with the Ouroboros Stone before his passing. Much later, after the party reach Swordmarch as Vandham had recommended, it's revealed that he and other denizens of the City wore these eyepatches over the eye that contained their Iris when out on missions with the Lost Numbers. These eyepatches had small fragments of Origin metal that served to obscure them from Moebius' tracking systems. The party would even obtain these eyepatches for themselves, and would be automatically equipped with them whenever they journeyed from the City; the Kevesi team members over their right eyes, the Agnians over their left.
  • From Kingdom Hearts II, Xigbar, of Organization XIII, plays this trope to the hilt. Not only does he have an eyepatch, but several scars running across his face. Of all the Organization, he carries himself almost like a seasoned warrior. At one point, he even hints to Sora that he has fought several Keyblade Masters before him. Except for Xemnas and Roxas, that's probably the closest any member of the Organization gets to having an actual backstory. It's confirmed in Kingdom Hearts: Birth by Sleep that he did in fact meet and fight previous keyblade masters— Terra, Ven, and Aqua. It's also confirmed in Kingdom Hearts III that he's the current incarnation of Luxu, a Keyblade Master.
    • Terra is also the one who gave him the need to wear an eyepatch in the first place, adding weight to his words in Kingdom Hearts II.
    • Also in the Kingdom Hearts series, Riku spends a long period with a blindfold on. It's not directly stated why he wears it; the most explanation we get is Mickey in KH2 saying he wore it because 'his eyes couldn't lie', and when Sora asks who he was trying to fool, Riku says himself. It's also never made clear whether he can see through it, although the fact that he has lifted it on occasion suggests that he can't. Some of his more badass moments involve the blindfold. As Roxas found out the hard way, if he takes it off, you're on for a major beatdown courtesy of Xehanort's Heartless.
    • DiZ uses a belt to this effect. Yes, on his head.
    • Although there is nothing wrong with his eye, Sora wears an orange pumpkin mask over his right eye whenever he is in Halloween Town, serving as an eyepatch. Of course, it's still possible to see his covered eye in some cutscenes, and with the right angle with the camera in gameplay. In Kingdom Hearts II, the magic from Sora's drive attire would end up in his mask while in this world, allowing it to change shape whenever Sora uses a drive form. In the Final Mix version for the same game, Sora wears a black Santa Claus hat in Christmas Town that also covers his eye, though the right camera angle still makes the eye (but not the mask) visible. The magic from the mask is now transferred to the hat.
  • Metal Gear:
    • Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater:
      • Subversion: when Naked Snake (later named Big Boss) gets his eye muzzle-burned and is rewarded with an eyepatch, he has quite a touching scene in which he attempts to catch a moth, but fails because of his poor depth perception. (Since Word of God says that Snake's codename was inspired by Escape from New York's Snake Plissken, the eyepatch doubles as a Shout-Out.) The lead female expresses pity, but he shrugs it off. The first person view for the player goes a bit funny, too - the lost eye was his dominant one, so that's what he habitually aligns his gunsights to. Later in the game, however, he is wiring a base up with plastic explosive. He molds it into the shape of a moth, throws it up into the air, and catches it - "Got you this time," he tells it, then attaches it to the detonator.
      • Strangely, in a later scene, the player needs to fire a sniper rifle at explosives to destroy the Shagohad, and when that fails he switches to an RPG, all of this with his standard pinpoint accuracy - which normally would be fine, except the sight is on the right side and cannot be moved. Guess which side his eyepatch is on. And the kicker? You can still see down the sight of the RPG in First-Person View. Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots and Metal Gear Solid: Peace Walker both allow Snake and Big Boss to fire their guns with either their left or right hands, which in the case of Big Boss would allow him to look down the scope/iron sight with his left eye. Such ambidextrous shooting however is never displayed by Big Boss in Metal Gear Solid 3, his eye patch must really have power if he can see through it even when it is on.
    • One of his sons, later in the series's chronology, is actually happy to lose his eye in a plane crash - now he looks like his father. However, this is subverted, as an easy way to defeat him in the final boss battle is to approach him from the side of his missing eye, where he has a small blind spot.
    • Furthermore, in Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns of the Patriots, Solid Snake is given the Solid Eye device, an advanced monocular display mounted in an eyepatch. Combat advantage? Definitely. Looks cool? Possibly enough to balance out the Dick Van Dyke mustache. In any case, it makes him look almost exactly like his father.
    • In Metal Gear Rising, Raiden covers his damaged left eye with a cloth when he gets a new cyborg body, but the cloth is covered in sensors that act as a replacement eye, allowing him to keep full vision.
  • The titular character of Monster Hunter (PC) is a one-eyed Hunter of Monsters skilled in using various weapons, and can take down hordes and hordes of deadly monsters.
  • Wildcat Gun Machine sees you playing as an eyepatched mercenary, Cat, who slays monsters by the hundreds easily.
  • In early World of Warcraft one of the most potent pieces of leather armor was an eyepatch called the Eye of Rend, which rather counter-intuitively increased your critical strike chance. Eyepatches still show up occasionally, where they provide just as much armor as a full helm of the same type.
  • Garrett of the Thief series of stealth-based video games had his eye yanked out of his head during the events of the first installment, and had it replaced with a mechanical one that allows him to telescope his vision. While more of an extraordinarily skilled Deadpan Snarker than an out-and-out badass, he's still not someone you'd ever want to mess with.
  • In Grim Fandango the protagonist Manny's sidekick Glottis, in awe after an eyepatch-wearing, gruff, salty sailor type has given a stirring speech, whispers "Wowww! Manny, could I have an eyepatch?"
  • Since the Yagyu Jubei from the Samurai Shodown games is supposed to be the one from real life, he wears an eyepatch. Notable for him and Sagat earlier ... the nature of the graphics means the patch switches from one eye to the other when the character changes which way he's facing.
  • Sion from Treasure of the Rudra not only has an Eyepatch Of Power but said eyepatch hides the Cosmic Keystone that got embedded in his eye after a battle against Surt.
  • Zato-1 from Guilty Gear is blind and blindfolded (his name is a homage to blind swordsman Zatoichi). He's supposedly able to access better senses than with his eyes, which probably means that his shadow, the sentient bioweapon Eddie, sees for him. He is reasonably badass...for a dead guy (though Eddie's also pretty badass itself.
  • Georg Prime in Suikoden V wears an eyepatch over his left eye. Even with the handicap, he's considered the greatest swordsman around, with a reputation for defeating all foes with his first attack. He eventually tells the main character that in his youth, he was careless in a battle and was slashed in the face, only surviving because the main character's father rescued him. Still later, he reveals that the slash actually missed his eye, and that he wears the eyepatch as a reminder not to get too cocky. At that point he discards the eyepatch, deciding he doesn't need it anymore.
    • Geddoe from Suikoden III also wears one of these.
      • Though in his case, it's actually handled somewhat more realistically; his accuracy stat is quite low, and the absolute worst of all the playable storyline characters.
  • James "Paladin" Taggart is depicted with an eyepatch in Super Wing Commander, though in the other Wing Commander games featuring the character, he has the use of both eyes. He gains no special powers or abilities from missing an eye (indeed, as an AI wingman he is somewhat mediocre, even compared to other AI wingmen), but he is an experienced combat pilot whose career spans several decades.
  • Fire Emblem has quite a few eyepatch wearers.
    • Fire Emblem: Shadow Dragon & the Blade of Light and Fire Emblem: Mystery of the Emblem have General Lorenz of Grust. Malice, a character introduced in spinoff material before making her way into New Mystery of the Emblem, also wears one.
    • Fire Emblem: The Blazing Blade's antagonist, Nergal, has one eye covered by his loose turban-like wrap, but that's as close as it gets... at least until the finale, when he takes it off to reveal some badass scars.
    • Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance and Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn have Haar, and the latter game introduces Nailah.
    • Fire Emblem: Awakening's Basilio, one of the Khans of Feroxi, sports one. It's also possible to give a build 2 Female Avatar one.
    • Fire Emblem Fates's Niles is a very cynical Anti-Hero, and wears a rather cool blue eyepatch with a star on it. It's also possible to give the Avatar one, whether in white or in black, no matter the build or gender this time. There's also the 'Cross Eyepatch' accessory one can buy and give to anyone in the party, but in this case, it's simply for Rule of Cool rather than necessity.
    • Fire Emblem: Three Houses's Dimitri, who is one of the protagonists of the game, wears an eyepatch after the timeskip in every route but Crimson Flower. It is briefly deconstructed in the advice boxes, where he needs eye drops to do paperwork.
    • Fire Emblem Heroes: Many of the above also return for this game. In addition, Sutur's Perilous Seas alt sports one of these, and among the accessories are a few eyepatches that can be put on any character able to wear mask-type accessories.
  • Auron of Final Fantasy X has one missing eye, partially concealed with sunglasses. Not quite an eyepatch, but it should be noted that after losing his eye, he took levels exclusively in badassery.
  • Likewise, in Gungrave, Grave lost his left eye when he was murdered. He wears glasses with the left lens blacked out and a white cross on top of that to conceal it, although sometimes his hair has the same effect. Like Auron above it's not quite an eyepatch but Grave did take several levels of badass after being resurrected.
  • General Beatrix of Final Fantasy IX has a badass metal eyepatch, and the first fights against her cannot be won. The goal is only to survive.
  • Forcystus from Tales of Symphonia has both an Eyepatch Of Power and an Arm Cannon that appears to replace his left arm (actually, his arm is inside the thing and can be seen during some of his attacks when the arm cannon opens up.
  • The Demoman from Team Fortress 2 wears one, and is actually quite bitter about having lost his eye, referring to himself as a 'black, Scottish cyclops'. His lack of an eye has minimal impact on the player when playing as himnote ; however, and he still performs quite adequately considering his weapon of choice is a grenade launcher.
    • He seems really bitter.
    ...prancin' aboot with yer heads full of eyeballs!
    • Seems to run in the family; a comic released prior to his (and the Soldier's) update reveals that both the RED Demoman's parents are blind, a result of the family profession being demolitions.
    RED Demoman's Mum: Mark me, boy: no Demoman worth his sulfur ever had an eye in his head past thirty!
    • In one comics it was revealed that a wizard Merasmus took his eye, after a sentient book possessed the eye for the lols. In one of the Halloween maps, the players fight Merasmus, and the Demoman seems really eager to kick his ass.
    • Taken to its logical conclusion when playing as a Demoknightnote  with the Eyelander sword or its functional equivalents. Such a Demoknight starts slower and weaker than a stock Demoman, but quickly surpasses stock after gaining enough heads from kills. Gaining heads also adds a glow in/over the eyepatch, possibly implying Magical Eye (Socket) is in play; the higher a Demoknight's headcount, the stronger the glow.
    • Originally exaggerated for comedy with the Eye-Catcher cosmetic. Yes, it gives all classes an eyepatch, but concept art reveals the artist had wanted it to cover Demoman's remaining eye. Valve nixed this idea, sadly denying players the comedy of a Demoman who can't see anything.
    • In Search for Sandvich, whenever Gary Schwartz switches from Heavy to Demoman, he visually indicates it by putting on an eyepatch.
  • Sakuma from Inazuma Eleven wears an eyepatch over his right eye. While part of Shin Teikoku, his right eye is visible through a hole in his eyepatch and he's revealed to have black sclerae, possibly a side effect of the Aliea Meteorite.
  • In NieR Gestalt, the Protagonist wears an eyepatch after the five-year Time Skip. His younger Replicant counterpart does not.
  • Genshin from Ninja Gaiden II.
  • Drachma of Skies of Arcadia has a literal Eyepatch of Power. The accessory he starts with is an eyepatch that increases his attack power slightly when he has it equipped.
    • Vyse has an eyepatch-like lens over one eye - he has two good eyes, although the equipped lens is supposed to increase his accuracy. It gives him telescopic sight in that eye, too. The original lens is also replaced with one that allows him to see Moonfish in the remake.
      • This carries over to his cameo in Valkyria Chronicles, where he retains his signature goggle patch and is easily one of the best Shocktroopers in the game.
  • Gippal of Final Fantasy X-2. The Mexican Standoff kind of forces that point home, too.
  • Lucian of Lunar Knights has an eyepatch. He's also former prodigy member of the Three Gunslingers Sartana.
  • Wolf O'Donnell of Star Fox goes through several variations of this. In the prototype Star Fox 2, he is depicted with a scar over one of his eyes, while in Star Fox 64, he sports an eyepatch (over the opposite eye), and from Star Fox: Assault onwards, he wears a cybernetic eyepatch. Although some have assumed that his left eye is missing, his Assault model shows that it is still there, and can even be seen during certain cutscenes. He's even seen without the eyepatch in his concept art.
  • Interesting example from the Empire Earth opening movie. You see four warriors in four dramatically different epochs (stone age, British imperial age, second world war and the future). The stone age warrior has a white (blind) left eye, the imperial sea-captain has a cloth in front of his, the WWII commander has a standard black eyepatch and the futuristic warrior has a cyborg left eye.
  • Lord David from The Last Remnant takes this to a particularly literal level. In battle, he wears an eyepatch that appears to be tied into the aiming or activation of the remnant Gae Bolg — an enormous energy cannon. It even has a name — "Kellendros" — and is described as the "Trigger device of the Gae Bolg", though it may be that Kellendros and Ex Machina (his uber gun) are dual triggers for it, since both are used to summon the extra uber cannon.
  • Alfred Woden of the Max Payne series wears a special pair of glasses which are shaded over his right eye. This was meant to evoke Odin, as was his last name, since Oden himself wore an eyepatch, and thus establishes himself as the one running the show. Max himself notes "In the Land of the Blind, the One-Eyed Man is King"
  • Baron Praxis in Jak II: Renegade has a highly visible bionic eye. His Dragon, Erol, ends up with only half his head semi-intact with a mechanical body, giving him his very own bionic eye (and face, and torso, and legs...). For a more heroic example, Sig has yet another bionic eye. Yeah, Naughty Dog Software seem to enjoy this one.
  • Monster Hunter:
    • Monster Hunter 3 (Tri): Your character has 2 if you are female and one if you are male, the female has an exclusive helmet in the deviljho gunner set with an eyepatch, and both genders have the Wyvernking Eyepatch which has 3 slots and is upgradeable.
    • Monster Hunter: World has the Dragonking Eyepatch, which gives two levels of the extremely strong Weakness Exploit skill and a deceptively high amount of protection. Plus it has this description:
    "Put this baby on to double your manliness instantly. Ideal for the grittier guys and gals."
  • In Ratchet & Clank Future: Tools of Destruction, the Smuggler has an eyepatch. It's probably just for show though, since in his first scene he lifts up the eyepatch and glares at Ratchet with the eye underneath (which appears normal). Also, the eyepatch switches sides between scenes . . . and this isn't a sprite game.
  • In BlazBlue, Nu-13 has an Eyepatch Of Power that is replaced by a visor whenever she activates the angelic-looking Murakumo unit. Disturbingly, the eyepatch in question has a design akin to a red sphere with a thick black stripe running down the middle at an angle. Note the similar design on the back of protagonist Ragna's right hand. In case it isn't obvious, Nu is dangerous.
  • Persona 3: Mitsuru's father, Takeharu, who runs the omnipresent Kirijo Group corporation.
  • Persona 4: Arena Ultimax gives Marie the option of wearing an eyepatch over her forward eye whereas most other characters in the game have glasses. The eyepatch is a reference to the unnatural color that Marie's left eye attains in her dungeon in Persona 4 Golden.
  • Persona 5: The Twins, who serve as the game's ultimate Superboss, each wear an eyepatch on the opposite eye. Their true form, Lavenza, does not have one. Party member Ryuji Sakamoto's Fighting Spirit, a badass skeletal pirate, also wears an eyepatch, despite not having physical eyes anymore, because it goes with his pirate motif.
  • Sengoku Basara has Date Masamune and Chosokabe Motochika. Masamune's eyepatch of power is so badass that it's a tsuba. You see.
  • Masamune also makes an appearance in Samurai Warriors and Warriors Orochi.
  • In Final Fantasy XI, there is Balrahn, celebrated hero and Emperor of Aht Urghan, who in his day managed to collect 20 unique weapons (one for each job class, conveniently) as war trophies during epic battles with foreign powers. These "Mythic Weapons", now locked in the Empire's vaults, are obtainable by the player after completing a series of difficult and/or time-consuming tasks, one of which is to obtain Balrahn's Eyepatch, which is described as a sacred relic.
    • Don't forget Gilgamesh, the pirate with an eye patch of power.
    • ...And Moblin Maze Mongers event has an eye patch as a possible reward.
  • Averted in the later Twisted Metal games with Calypso. As the organizer of the tournament, and a Literal Genie with all sorts of power, one would think an eyepatch would suit him. Except in the early games, he had both eyes, and in later games when he's missing one (with no explanation) he gladly shows off the gaping hole.
  • John Marston, the protagonist of Red Dead Redemption wears one in the 'Deadly Assassin' outfit which, humorously, improves his slow-motion 'Dead-eye Aim'.
    • Though some voice lines hint towards him possibly having a blind eye.
  • Ellie Langford, deutragonist of Dead Space 2 loses her eye to Titan Station's resident mental patient Nolan Stross, and it is shown in a rather humourous and awesome moment. "You owe me an eye, you bastard!"
    • She gets a prosthetic in the sequel. Shame.
  • In Splinter Cell: Conviction, the imagery is evoked with both the co-op player characters rendered in the loading screen with their sonar goggles only covering one eye. This also applies to the enemy Splinter Cells. Appropriately, the latter are Elite Mooks. However, the biggest badass, protagonist Sam Fisher, wears his goggles covering both eyes.
  • Big Bad Morden of Metal Slug bears one of these over his right eye. He lost that eye in the Central Park Bombing that also killed his young son, giving him his reasons for defecting from the Regular Army. Also used for a bit of Fridge Brilliance in Metal Slug 3... The Morden you fight at the midway point of the Final Mission has the patch over the left eye... it's a Mars Person in disguise.
  • Captain Price in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare invokes this with his night-vision goggles — it's more of a monocle.
  • Goro Majima of the Like a Dragon series has an eyepatch over his left eye. It does little to stop him from being one of the series' canonically best fighters and consistently hardest bosses to fight. The fourth game shows that he got it due to refusing to sell out his blood brother and had it stabbed out by the tanto he now carries.
  • Iorveth, elvish terrorist/guerilla leader from The Witcher 2. Iorveth covers the remains of his right eye with a tilted bandana and has spent the better part of a century fighting humans.
    • Sorceress Philippa Eilhart has both her eyes carved out as punishment for conspiration in The Witcher 2. In the next game she sports replacement magical eyes, only visible by a faint glow under her blindfold.
  • As with the Real Life person he's based on, Masamune from Pokémon Conquest is the one-eyed warlord of Avia with dreams of uniting the entirety of Rensai under his rule. In fact, during the post-game challenge The Dragon's Dream, Masamune does just that. His Warrior skill is One-Eyed Dragon.
  • In Super Time Force, Commander Repeatski, savior of the world, has two eyepatches, one for each eye.
  • A character customization option in Star Trek Online. Klingons get a leather patch with three metallic studs on it for free, and you can buy a pirate-style patch to cover either eye as a microtransaction.
  • In Yu-Gi-Oh! Reshef of Destruction, Pegasus sports a golden eyepatch over his left eye, covering the socket where his Millennium Eye used to be.
  • In Billy vs. SNAKEMAN, the titular Billy (a parody of Naruto) wears an eyepatch at level one. If you level him up once (by, specifically, defeating a pirate) he dons a second eyepatch over his other eye, which somehow makes him more powerful. And if you do the quest that gets him to level three, he dons a third eyepatch. (Where he puts it, the game doesn't say.)
  • Taupy from Sands of Destruction wears an eye patch over his right eye (except when he faces the other way). He lost it when he accepted a duel-by-proxy job and wound up fighting his best friend.
  • In Dragon Age: Inquisition, The Iron Bull wears an eyepatch over his left eye, lost to being gouged out by a flail while protecting Krem, a man he didn't know at the time, who later became his second-in-command.
  • Siripent has one in Telepath Tactics. It's never explained where he got it.
  • Keith Martin from Time Crisis 5.
  • Apparently the Hero of Time lost an eye at some point, because he has one eye blacked out (in both his human and wolf forms) when he appears as the Hero's Shade in Twilight Princess.
  • Two characters in Evolve have these. Markov, the Sole Survivor of a corporate mercenary raid on his colony from either side, and Hyde, a Blood Knight veteran of The First Mutagen War.
  • Ana from Overwatch was a crack sniper who had her right eye— a cybernetic one which gave her six times normal vision — shot out by a rival sniper via Scope Snipe. She now chooses to wear an eyepatch, despite the availability of medical options to replace the missing eye.
  • In Darkest Dungeon, the Man-at-arms is missing an eye, and his backstory comic doesn't give an explanation, although it shows that he was the Sole Survivor of his squad back before joining the heroes.
  • Viktor from Paladins has both his eyes, but can wear different kinds of eyepatches as a cosmetic accessory. And Dredge the undead pirate.
  • Yandere Simulator:
    • While the members of the Occult Club all have something covering one eye, they're considered creepy and aren't played attention to much (and it's possible none of them are actually missing an eye).
    • Student Council member Aoi Ryugoku also has an eyepatch, and pulls off this trope much better (case in point, she's the enforcer of the Student Council). Unlike the Occult Club, she is confirmed to be missing an eye. It's rumored Student Council President Megami Saikou has something to do with her missing eye but nothing's been proven.
  • God Eater has a sniper, Gina with a purple eye patch over her left eye. Player characters can wear one too over either eye, with five different types to choose from. The two smaller variants however don't stick to the face fully, meaning that you can see under them with a proper angle.
  • Jacker of Ghost 1.0 has a cybernetic implant resembling an eyepatch which covers his left eye.
  • Kaeya, Fischl, and Beidou in Genshin Impact. Particularly Beidou as she is a pirate captain. She's also probably the only one who actually needs it as Kaeya and Fischl only wear theirs as stylistic choices.
  • Kiria from Tokyo Mirage Sessions ♯FE has an eyepatch in her Carnage form.
  • Trails:
    • General Zechs Vander notably sports one of these, and is actually called "One-Eyed Zechs".
    • Sigmund Orlando also sports one of these, presumably because mercenary work is particularly dangerous for eyeballs.
    • Prince Olivert sports one of these from Trails of Cold Steel IV onwards, as a result of surviving an assassination attempt by the Gnomes.
  • In Final Fantasy XIV, the fearsome Black Mages of ancient Mhach would wear eyepatches and wide-brimmed hats to obstruct the gaze of Voidsent abs prevent them from using eye contact to establish control over them, and this is reflected in how all the black mage artifact armor includes an eyepatch. Interestingly, though it’s never called out such, the same seems to go for Reapers, who wear eyepatches in their signature outfits and also deal with voidsent as part of their power.
  • In Battle for Wesnoth, the highest advancement of Thug, named Highwayman, wears an eyepatch. Fittingly, Highwayman is the strongest unit in terms of melee combat among the outlaw units.
  • Smith has one in 2Dark
  • A Very Long Rope to the Top of the Sky: In one of Flavio's sermons, Desdemona reveals that she doesn't like her eyepatch's intimidation factor since it makes her for her to find love:
    Desdemona: It's the eyepatch, isn't it?! [pause for player input] I can't help it if it makes me look intimidating!
    I've had it ever since that skiing accident in the fifth grade!

    Visual Novels 
  • Ace Attorney:
    • Apollo wears an eyepatch in the first and last two cases of Dual Destinies. This and his Coat Cape imply that he's become a ''lot'' more hard-boiled since the last game, but the eyepatch is actually a Power Limiter for his perception ability so he wouldn't have to notice Athena lying about her relation to his best friend's death.
    • Dhurke Sahdmadhi, his foster father, also wears one. Ga'ran's propaganda certainly makes full use of it to make the rebel leader seem menacing. Subverted when it turns out that he's actually just a fun-loving goofball, but he still manages to pull off a few terrifying Death Glares
  • How do we know M in Shikkoku no Sharnoth is awesome even before he does anything? Guess. Interestingly enough, despite it being implied that the eye underneath it actually works fine, it is never removed.
  • Masamune Date from Ikemen Sengoku is a handsome, cocky Spirited Competitor who wears an eyepatch over his right eye. He becomes even more badass when you learn the story behind his eyepatch: he lost his eye to smallpox when he was younger and after angsting about it for a while, decided to just cut short his self-pity party by asking one of his subordinates to cut the entire eye out for him. The female main character even thinks that "anything sounds good coming from a man with an eyepatch" in regards to him.
  • Galaxy Angel: Lester Coolduras, Tact's subcommander and best friend, always wears a rather cool-looking eyepatch over his left eye. One event in the first game has Almo and Coco asking Tact directly about it, and he can answer that he uses it to conceal a laser beam, an embarrassing birthmark that looks like a panda, or that he lost his eye in a duel with his father. All of these turn out to be jokes, as Tact immediately admits he has no idea because Lester never talks about it.

    Web Animation 
  • Plan 3: The cursed pirate has an eyepatch over his left eye. It’s not established if something happened to the eye before, or after he was cursed.

    Webcomics 
  • In The Adventures of Dr. McNinja, Judy's kitten had survived an attack from a dinosaur and now sports an eyepatch. It still looks very cute. The President of the United States is also shown to have one.
  • Like her canon counterpart, Integra in And Shine Heaven Now gets one in the end. During her brief period of unconsciousness, in which she talks with her mother, Integra admits that being able to intimidate people better with an eyepatch on was an experience worth living for.
  • Inverted in Angel Down with Maria, who only wears her eyepatch at formal events. She mostly preforms her badassery while wearing a pair of blacked out sunglasses.
  • In the Bad Future in Autumn Bay, both Johnny and Dr. Deacon have one, though Dr. Deacon's is the cybernetic version.
  • Tony the Tiger in Breakfast of the Gods
  • Champions of Far'aus: Wila, who was the Hyperia Pantheons previous High priestess introduced in the "Wills induction" short story (which chronologically takes place years before the main story), had an eyepatch that covered up a scar where her left eye should be.
  • In Commander Kitty, CK himself tries to invoke this, though even he admits it's probably overdoing things.
  • Crimson Flag: Ludovic, Lord Julian's right-hand man, has an eyepatch, though it's also mentioned that he uses a depth-perception spell.
  • Nimmel Feenix from Dominic Deegan had his right eye slashed to uselessness, so he combed his previously slicked-back hair in such a way as to cover it up. Curiously, The Infernomancer from who inflicted this injury also sported an eyepatch of power ? a blindfold with long spikes on the inside, that concealed magically ever-bleeding eyes (the mark of the demonic pact that gave him his powers).
    • At one point, Dominic was recovering from temporary blindness and had only gotten back his sight in one eye. He wore an eyepatch until his vision recovered; combined with his artificial leg, this gave rise to at least one pirate joke.
  • Fenny's manager, Missy, wears an eyepatch in the first two chapters of Furry Fight Chronicles to cover her missing eye, which she gave to a demon for fighting knowledge.
  • In Galactic Maximum, one uses a knife in the gun fight
  • Girl Genius:
    • The Smoke Knight Varpa is revealed to be hiding an eyepatch underneath the hood she keeps up and pulled over one eye.
    • Captain Hawkins, a privateer working for the British, wears a bandanna over one eye as part of her very piratey outfit, she is also an excellent fighter.
  • Chief from Goblins has a riveted-on eyepatch bearing his clan symbol (which was originally tattooed on near his lost eye. It doesn't make him markedly more badass, though. Most of the time.
  • Sydney from Grrl Power got one for an hour or so after a an incident with a noodle. It heals up within a few hours, but she keeps it anyway.
    Maxima: Do you still need that eye patch?
    Sydney: Um, no?
    Maxima: Take it off.
    Sydney: Aw.
  • Royce Lashiec of Heartcore takes to wearing one after the Prologue Arc.
  • Vriska of Homestuck sports one. Due to Ambidextrous Sprites, which eye it covers is never officially determined. It isn't until later in the Hivebent arc that we find out how she lost her eye (and arm) in the first place.
    • She later gets her eye and arm back, so she loses the patch.
    • Sollux wears two eyepatches (one red, one blue) on the pirate ship in the Furthest Ring. However, the fact that he lost his eyes means that he lost the ability to produce his insanely powerful Eye Beams, so he's sort of an inversion.
  • In It's Walky!, Penny Worthington was double the badass for wearing the eyepatch she took from her predecessor, Dargon Chesterfield, after assassinating him.
  • Nikolai Vankof, a former Soviet secret agent from The Incredible and Awe-Inspiring Serial Adventures of the Amazing Plasma-Man has an eyepatch over his right eye.
  • Viktor Vasko of Lackadaisy lost his right eye in a violent striker's rally, shortly before he became a rum runner for Atlas May.
  • Debbie in Latchkey Kingdom has both her eyes, but wears an eyepatch purely for Rule of Cool, and usually switches which eye is covered every appearance (one strip has her hit her uncovered eye while playing with nunchakas, so she moves the patch to cover that eye instead).
  • This is parodied in A Modest Destiny; Maureen's younger brother wears an eyepatch to impress new thieves guild members because he thought Maureen's looked cool.
    • And Maureen herself only wears her eyepatch to hide her heterochromia, which is seen as an ill omen.
  • The Order of the Stick:
  • Sarn Kellfrock of Planescape Survival Guide is an ancient duergar dwarf cleric who lost his eye to the future god Bane while defending his own god (Jergal's) realm. His eyepatch of power comes into play later on when he takes Bane's eye out before killing the god single-handedly.
  • In The Wotch, there's DeFrain the Pirate - a member of La Résistance, whose piratey eyepatch hides a magical eye capable of seeing through anything, as well as detecting magical auras - handy for checking out whether a ship contains anything worth stealing. He also appears to be a Ninja Pirate.
  • Agent Jim of Mayu Zane's Siege is nearly shot down in one scene because of a gunner on his left-and he's blind in his left eye, which he neglected to mention to anyone previously.
    • There were previous references to his hidden face being badly hurt or burned, however.
      • Zane would know-he's blind (or nearly so) in one of his eyes as a result of a detached retina.
  • From Sidekicks, Kyle (aka One-Eyed Shadow) is a villain-turned-sidekick who wears an eyepatch over his right eye. His right eye isn't seen when he enters a shadow-like form so it may not be functioning.
  • Hwaryun from Tower of God ever since Bam cut her right eye. As a girl, all her eyepatches are also very stylish.
    • Sachi Faker now sports a stylish black eyepatch-thing(?) over his left eye 600 years after he first took on the Hell Train.
  • The First Mate, Marge, of I Was Kidnapped by Lesbian Pirates from Outer Space!!! sports an eyepatch.
  • The Suicide Girl from Sexy Losers. She's an animated corpse; the eyepatch covers the eye she accidentally shot herself through (she was toweling her hair and blindly picked up what she thought was her hairdryer; unfortunately, she kept her gun next to her hairdryer for some reason...).
  • In The KAMics, Ratatosk (self-proclaimed) god of the squirrels wears one to seem more Odin-like. Since both eyes are good he occasionally switches which eye it covers.
  • In Ben Croshaw's webcomic Yahtzee Takes On The World, the alternate universe Anti-Yahtzee has the token alt-self eyepatch, as well as the other inevitable deliberate clichés of the identical-but-opposite-color clothing and the typical facial hair inversion.
  • Vanka the theif from Oglaf, who wears a rolled headband with the hem positioned to cover her missing eye.
  • Kogeru from Rune Master: Tales of A demon Slayer wears an eyepatch on his (functioning) right eye, to cover the word "traitor" tattooed on its lid.
  • Roommates played with this trope as two characters wore eye-patches. Odin is obviously a straight example, but the other one Mortal!Jareth an inversion as he literally had an Eyepatch of Depower covering his left eye (he normally has heterochromia as a sign of his magical heritage), he got better.
  • Qamra Umar of Pacificators fame lost an eye and an ear to a bomb. She covers it up with hair.
  • Rhapsodies: Commander Mercédès Vampa, Conal's commanding officer, and crush. (Apparently she stole her eyepatch from a pirate.)''
  • Myra Rienkemeyer from Skin Deep. Both her eyes work fine, but due to a damaged medallion the left one is stuck permanently as the Glowing Eye of Doom of her bugbear form. She keeps it covered with an eyepatch unless she's got her Game Face on.
  • The Raider, the most powerful and notorious villain in the world in A Hate Story, wears one to cover the blank spot where his left eye socket should be. He has Super-Senses, but notably poor depth perception.
  • Dante in The Story of Anima wears a metal one over his magic eye.
  • The title character of The Legend of Lucy wears one over her left eye.
  • Unsounded: Irma Keon, a powerful battle wright and Crescian state Aseptick, is introduced with a bandage over her right eye while decimating Aldish troops.
  • Val in Val and Isaac. Cybernetics exist in-universe, but Val's allergic, so she just covers up her missing eye. She's also a Badass Normal.
  • In a guest strip of The Last Days of FOXHOUND, after checking to see that nobody was watching him, Liquid decided to see what he'd look like if he had an eyepatch like Big Boss before him. However, the ghost of Big Boss is always watching...

    Web Original 
  • Parodied in Billy vs. SNAKEMAN, where Billy's power is proportional to how many eyepatches he's wearing. When he reaches his highest level, he puts on a third eyepatch.
  • In a Cracked article about soldiers shrugging off horribly painful and debilitating wounds, all of the top 3 had eyepatches. The article briefly commented by saying something along the lines "Having an eyepatch is like taking the express lane to being a badass."
  • Xinjao O'Reilly in Tech Infantry wears one after being tortured by having a soldering iron thrust into one eye. This also comes shortly after he Took a Level in Badass and went from comic-relief engineer with a Porn Stash to resourceful leader of a guerrilla band of engineers and admiral of his own private mercenary space fleet.
  • Sylvester in Twig loses an eye to the Baron Richmond, and sports an eyepatch until he gets it replaced. When he runs into the Baron again, though, he puts the eyepatch back on to disguise that he's filled his eye with massive amounts of poison so he can squirt it at people as a one-use weapon.

    Web Videos 
  • Sarge in Agents of Cracked has one of these, although it's probably only for looks since it keeps switching eyes.
  • Apollo Z. Hack. No reason is given for why he wears it; it just looks badass.
  • Board James: Bad Luck Bootsy has an eye patch after he got stabbed in the eye by Tornado Rex on his first appearance.
  • Camp Camp:
    • Snake, whose name that doesn't hide who he is a parody of.
    • Flower Scout Tabii starts wearing an eyepatch (caused by being hit in the eye by a fork... thrown by herself) in the same episode where she and her friends become drug lords that can even take down the Mexican cartel.
  • Colonel Blitzer from Coyle Command has one. You may notice it switches eye from time to time.
  • Lord Commander Mason Garrilac of Death from Above sports one. Presumably he lost his eye in battle, being a mech warrior. In one episode where he's piloting a mech and misses terribly he mentions lack of depth perception as the reason.
  • In I Am Not Infected Amanda sports one in her first appearance. She quickly stops wearing it, and with it her status as a badass.
  • Pirates SMP:
    • Invoked for Graecie, who started wearing her eye-patch because "that's how she earns respect around here", rather than being actually unable to see out of that eye. She also constantly lies about why she wears the eye-patch to everyone else. It's likely that she did so because while her faction, the Nightingales, get along with the other factions without much issue, they are also often overlooked for being "softies".
    • Kuervo wears a gold-lined eye-patch; the finale reveals that it's a Battle Trophy from killing Commander Miria (the eye-patch's previous owner) of the Nayan Armada, from which (and more) he'd become a Defector from Decadence and gone on the run.
  • World War II: The series discusses the incredible exploits of British general Carton de Wiart who sports one of these after being shot in the face during World War I.

    Western Animation 
  • Kim Possible:
    • Dr. Director and her evil (fraternal) twin brother have eye patches, and are some of the most competent fighters in the series. Dr. Director is primarily a parody/homage to Nick Fury.
    • An extra in the "A Sitch in Time" DVD shows a future Kim as Dr. Director's successor. She also wears an eyepatch.
  • Parodied in Rocko's Modern Life, with the charter boat captain "Two-Patch" Crappie Jack (yes, that is his name). He can't walk too well. Two wooden legs. Can't steer too well. Two wooden arms. Can't see too well. Two wooden eyes.
  • While it's not technically an eyepatch, your chances of badassness go way up in Transformers if you have one optic sensor rather than two. Shockwave is probably the most obvious of these.
    • Transformers: Animated shows it off well. Compare Longarm Prime to Shockwave.
    • Transformers: Prime gives one to Breakdown, after MECH removed his eye. Presumably Megatron forbids letting him get a replacement eye as punishment for getting captured by Puny Humans.
  • In Codename: Kids Next Door, the candy pirate Stickybeard has a patch. (And a peg leg, and a hook hand; he's pretty much Dressed to Plunder.)
  • Bounty Hamster: Marion, one of several shout-outs to True Grit. Alt!Cassie from "Twin Cheeks" also has one.
  • Matrix, the grown-up Enzo from ReBoot's third season, has a golden cybernetic eye that provides super targeting abilities, which he received after the original was cut out. By THE DEVIL in a Mortal Kombat-ish game.
    • Parodied with the pirate bi-nomes. There's at least one "zero" bi-nome with two patches that optionally hide two good eyes, and there's at least one "one" bi-nome with a single patch over it's only perfectly fine eye.
  • Gutierrez, Ricardo Montalbán's character on Freakazoid!, had an eye patch. When he transformed into his "super freak" form, it had an eye painted over it, and an energy weapon behind it.
    • Subversion: His eye is perfectly normal before he mutates, and this eyepatch is important to his painful defeat.
  • Falcon 7, Birdman's boss in Birdman (1967) has an eyepatch. That, of course, becomes a source of many jokes in Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law, where Falcon 7 becomes Phil Ken Sebben.
    • Ha ha! Power!
    • In the "New Year's Eve Party at Brak's House" series of bumps, Hesh doesn't believe that Phil needs the patch, calling it 'Your Bum Eye And How It Doesn't Exist'.
  • Hudson, from Gargoyles, has only one good eye due to a wound that either stayed with him due to its magical origin or didn't heal properly before sunrise. In either case, throughout the series it's implied that while he might be getting a little old and slow and even his good eye is starting to fail, he's a canny warrior whose insight is invaluable.
  • The Pirate Captain from Mike, Lu & Og has two eyepatches (as well as two wooden legs). This doesn't seem to slow him down much, although he's not very badass because he and his men are always being defeated by a bunch of kids.
  • Popeye, while not wearing an eyepatch, misses one eye. He just keeps eyelids permanently closed.
  • Subversion during the pirate episode of The Backyardigans: Uniqua has an eyepatch, but she only wears it to show she's a pirate. In other words, Eyepatch Does Nothing during the episode.
  • Parodied in The Tick episode "That Moustache Feeling", where the Tick meets Jim Rave, Agent of S.H.A.V.E.. Rave is a Nick Fury lookalike, down to the eyepatch-but at the episode's end, the Tick realizes Rave isn't a real special agent because he still has both eyes-the eyepatch is just there to make him look cool.
  • Tako from Sushi Pack wears a fake eyepatch that does not diminish his fighting prowess in the least. Then again, considering that his main attack is flinging paint at enemies, direct aim may not be crucial.
  • Suzi X from The Haunted World of El Superbeasto.
  • Pariah Dark in Danny Phantom. Probably doesn't suffer any depth perception since he's a ghost.
    • The once useless Box Ghost will eventually become a Future Badass who can fight on par with any of the major villains. His secret? An eyepatch.
  • The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy gives us resident badass, Hoss Delgado. Complete with Swiss-Army Appendage.
  • Gibbs in Titan Maximum, who's both the main villain and probably one of the smartest characters in the series.
  • In Street Sharks, big bad villain Dr. Paradigm wears an eyepatch for no explained reason. He starts off the show as an implied college lecturer. It's somewhat badass in context.
  • The Fairly OddParents!:
  • G.I. Joe
    • While villain Maj. Bludd's actual status as a badass is more than a little questionable on the show, the patch at least made him look suitably badass. His Renegades incarnation, however, has more than earned his badass cred (and likely the eyepatch itself) in his debut episode.
    • Zanzibar the Dreadnok Pirate has one, but his teammates think it's for show, as he's little more than a Spoiled Brat who thinks he's badass.
    • Gen Abernathy from G.I. Joe: Renegades sports one of these.
  • Something of a subversion on Captain Planet and the Planeteers. Mad Scientist Dr. Blight is blonde, but wears one shock of long white hair over one of her eyes. This would seem to be this trope... except that the hair is actually hiding the fact that part of her face is deformed.
  • Alejandro gets punched in the eye in an episode of Total Drama World Tour, resulting in him having to wear an eyepatch for the rest of the episode.
  • On Jimmy Two-Shoes the bailiffs in the Horn Fairy Court wear eyepatches with stars on them.
  • The lead character of Danger Mouse has one. People who worked on the show can't seem to agree on whether he lost an eye or he just has it to be fashionable.
    • The current reboot kits DM with an eyepatch with modern technical advances (it's an "i-patch.")
  • Jonathan Kidd, the commander of the Voyager in the Fantastic Voyage animated series.
  • In Gravity Falls, Grunkle Stan wears an eyepatch over a perfectly healthy eye in order to fit into the Mystery Shack's mood of strange and paranormal.
    • He wears it over his glasses!
    • Dipper borrows the look in "Boss Mable" when Stan's on vacation, as does Soos when he becomes the new manager of the Mystery Shack following Stan's retirement in the Grand Finale.
  • Mr. Fischoeder, the wealthy, eccentric, Affably Evil landlord on Bob's Burgers wears an eyepatch. The story behind it (he lost his eye while roughhousing with his brother as a child) isn't very impressive, though.
  • In Cat City the Dragon-in-Chief Fritz Teufel wears an eyepatch. When it gets torn off in the climactic fight, we get to see a ruby in his eye socket.
  • Nick Fury's becomes a plot point in Spider-Man: The Animated Series, due to a flipped picture printed by J. Jonah Jameson. The backwards picture is used by Chameleon to pretend to be Fury, only for everyone who's met him to figure it out.
  • Evil Morty, from Rick and Morty wears an eyepatch as a reference to this trope and as an Evil Twin. Both of his eyes are actually fully functional, but he uses the eyepatch as a device to remotely control Evil Rick. At the end of the episode, he got rid of the eyepatch when Evil Rick was killed.
  • Dawn of the Croods features Amber, the lead hunter of the community who wears an amber rock in her eye. Although jokes are made about her missing an eye, in one episode she gives the rock to Ugga as a symbolic gesture and everyone is surprised to find the eye underneath is just fine.
  • The Penguins of Madagascar:
    • Doctor Blowhole has a very functional cybernetic one on his missing right eye. He has a laser in it and once uses it as a remote control to his "scooter one-wheel thing."
    • The Red Squirrel has one. He has a button to launch a rocket under it.
  • Given an interesting twist in Aaahh!!! Real Monsters. Krumm and his father Horvak are both monsters consisting of a Cephalothorax that carry their disembodied eyes in their hands. However, Horvak lost one of his eyes when it was mistaken for a musket ball and so he carries the remaining eye in one hand while in the other he wears a black leather glove.
  • The pirate captain Two-Eyed Alonso in The Adventures of Puss in Boots, as his name (sort of) suggests, combines this trope with Extra Eyes.
  • Peter Pan & the Pirates: One antagonist was the ghost of Captain Hook's brother, Jasper Hook, who was known as "Captain Patch" because he had an eye-patch to go with his brother's Hook Hand.
  • Kwazii of The Octonauts wears one, as he was a pirate before he became an Octonaut and still affects some stereotypical piratical behaviors (other than plunder, of course). While it's never explicitly stated, he most likely wears it for the "able to switch between light and dark areas" reason - a few times, he lifts it up and shows that he still has both eyes.
  • We Bare Bears: Wallace, one of the Poppy Rangers, has an eye-patch she apparently gained trying to earn one of her merit badges. She apparently has no regrets.
  • Octavia in She-Ra and the Princesses of Power wears her Force Captain badge as an eyepatch, covering the damage done when a young Catra scratched her on the eye.
  • In Teen Titans Go!, Beast Boy gets an eyepatch made out of a metal plate and a chain as part of his "Scar Man" persona in the episode "Man Person".
  • SpongeBob SquarePants:
    • Portrayed by SpongeBob's voice actor, Tom Kenny, Patchy the Pirate is the President of the SpongeBob SquarePants Fan Club. He sports a fashionable black eyepatch which serves seemingly no reason other than to make him appear more badass than he already is. He can be blatantly seen switching the eyepatch from eye to eye proving the previous statement.
    • Parodied in "Arrgh!" when Spongebob and Patrick cosplay as pirates. Patrick puts eyepatches over both eyes and calls himself "Blindbeard the Pirate". Of course, he can't see anything and trips, so he removes them.
  • In Captain Pugwash, Pugwash's Arch-Nemesis Cut-Throat Jake sports an eyepatch and a Seadog Beard.
  • Pibby: The trailer shows Pibby with an eyepatch on after she receives an injury to one eye. It ties into her maturation and Character Development, as several scenes afterward show her acting as a sword-wielding leader.

    Real Life 
  • U.S. Representative Lt. Dan Crenshaw (R-TX) wears an eyepatch (and, in conjunction with his beard, arguably looks not unlike Big Boss.) A former Navy SEAL, Crenshaw lost his right eye in an IED blast in Afghanistan. Beneath it, he sports a glass eye with a Captain America emblem, which he showed to Chris Evans.
  • One of Alexander's generals (and a later ruler in his own right), Antigonus, was known by the nickname "Monopthalmus", or "the One-Eyed". Alexander's father Philip II of Macedon was one-eyed as well but lacked an eyepatch. After his damaged eye had been surgically removed, it was then sewn shut defeating the purpose of an eyepatch completely, though some portrayals do feature him with one.
  • Though he didn't wear an eyepatch, Horatio Nelson lost the sight in his right eye. He later went on to be arguably the most famous admiral in history. He famously ignored a signal not to engage a Danish fleet by holding his telescope to his blind eye and asserting that he could not see the signal to hold back. He went on to decisively win the Battle of Copenhagen. This event is considered the origin of the idiom "to turn a blind eye." As Captain Jack in the Aubrey-Maturin series put it, "Lord Nelson is a man of singular vision."
  • Hannibal Barca lost his eye while on the march from pink eye. Not long after this he launches a massive ambush on Roman forces in the Battle of Lake Trasimene.
  • Date Masamune lost an eye as a youth, and thus is often depicted as wearing an eyepatch. It didn't hinder him much, as he went on to defeat Japan's prominent strategists of the time. Legend says that he ripped it out himself when it was rendered useless by smallpox (though this is highly unlikely given that he was a young child when he contracted the illness). It earned him the nickname of One-Eyed Dragon; though it started off as a comment on his reckless nature, it later in his life became a term of respect. He is almost always portrayed with an eyepatch in fictional appearances, even though there's no record of him wearing one in real life.
  • Xiahou Dun, a Chinese general serving under Cao Cao during the late Eastern Han Dynasty. Reputedly, he was such a badass that, when an arrow shot him in the eye, he plucked it out and swallowed it to instill fear in his enemies. In most literary and pop culture depictions of him (read: Romance of the Three Kingdoms), he's wearing either an eyepatch or a bandanna around his eye.
  • Yagyu Jubei, one of the most famous and romanticized samurai of all time, is a somewhat more ambiguous case. Although portraits from his own time show him with two eyes, somewhere along the line of centuries spent telling and retelling his story it became traditional to depict him wearing an eyepatch. Whether the historical Jubei ever wore one or it comes from Kabuki exaggerations is open to debate, but it has become a traditional part of his character, usually with the explanation that he lost it as a child while training. Other movies show him being wounded by a cut to the face as an adult, but developing his skill to greater degrees afterwards.
  • Moshe Dayan, Israeli General and Defense Minister (including during the Six-Day war — when Israel battled against 3 armies and still managed to triple its land mass in six days), lost his left eye while infiltrating Vichy France-controlled Syria in WWII; the binoculars he was looking through were shot and the glass and metal destroyed his eye socket (the bulk of the binoculars probably slowed the bullet enough to save his life). He didn't like his black eyepatch (he went through several unsuccessful surgeries in an attempt to be rid of it), but it did make him look pretty badass. Nor did it slow him down when it came to the ladies — his first wife wrote a whole chapter of her autobiography about "Moshe's bad taste in women." When he was once stopped for speeding (with fellow minister/future PM and President Shimon Peres next to him), he told the police officer, "I can either look at the road or at the speedometer. Which would you prefer?"
  • Jan Žižka had already lost an eye, either in battle or due to a childhood accident depending on the source, by the time he became the leader of the Czech rebel faction in the Hussite Wars. He soon lost the other one as well but continued to lead his troops into battle personally despite being completely blind. As is fitting for a man of his stature, he is the subject of the world's tallest equestrian statue in Prague.
  • John Pendlebury, a famous archaeologist lost one eye, and made a point of being better at athletics because people assumed he couldn't. He later became a war hero in WWII, fighting Nazis in a critical battle on Crete.
  • Canadian Léo Major during WWII lost an eye in Normandy. He refused to be brought back home, saying that he "only needed one eye to aim at Germans". He went on to liberate a city (Zwolle) in the Netherlands from an entire German squad on his own by firing multiple rifles and throwing grenades, making the Germans rout as they believed they were being attacked by an entire platoon. He was actually awarded three DCMs, but turned the first one down because he thought General Montgomery, the man awarding it to him, was too stupid to be handing out medals. He died in 2008, and the Dutch Ambassador to Canada was present at his funeral. The city he liberated held a vigil.
  • Director Raoul Walsh lost an eye in a car accident, and took to wearing a very large black eyepatch. Opinions on his films remain pretty mixed (a common statement is that he "never let the truth get in the way of a good story," due to films like Gentleman Jim and They Died With Their Boots On taking significant historical liberties) but he's certainly one of the toughest looking directors ever. He also directed The Roaring Twenties, High Sierra, They Drive By Night, White Heat, and many other famous gangster films. White Heat in particular was the most violent film at the time of its release, broke the censorship code completely, and caused several revisions to the Code, ultimately leading to its downfall twenty years later. High Sierra was also one of Humphrey Bogart's first not-completely-villainous roles, and led to his general stardom.
  • Many directors of The Golden Age of Hollywood suffered accidents in their eyes that led to them wearing eyepatches which helped give them an aura of authority and respect that maintained discipline on set. John Ford, Fritz Lang, Andre de Toth and Nicholas Ray. The reasons why they wore eyepatches varies, with Lang having a weak eye on account of his service in the military during World War I while others insist they wore it as a cool accessory.
  • Pirates during the Golden Age of Piracy are often depicted with eyepatches. This might have come from pirate captains who, needing to go above and below decks constantly, would put an eyepatch over one eye above deck to avoid losing their dark-vision in that eye. The tales of Arab pirate Rahmah ibn Jabir al-Jalahimah, who wore it after losing an eye in battle in the 18th century, adds further fuel to the image.
  • The logo of the now-Las Vegas Raiders of the National Football League invokes the trope as part of their bad-boy outside-the-law image.
  • Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, a German soldier and aristocrat who lost his left eye, right hand, and two fingers from his remaining hand during an Allied air raid. He was the German equivilent of a Colonel Badass and had won the Iron Cross before becoming completely convinced that Hitler needed to be killed. He took a leading role in the 20 July Plot, the closest anyone ever got to assassinating Hitler. He was popularly portrayed in the film Valkyrie.
  • Steve Watt, a Wyoming State Trooper, was shot five times by a bank robber, one bullet of which came within about a paper's width of damaging his brain. Fortunately, he got better. While he isn't a State Trooper anymore, his eyepatch now undoubtedly adds to his presence as a D.A.R.E. instructor and ordained minister.
  • As an aside, losing an eye would have very little, if any, effect on long-range rifle accuracy such as sniping (presuming it wasn't their dominant eye) - in fact, USMC recruits (at least as of the early 90s) would be taught to close the eye opposite the one being used to sight with, and even issued an eyepatch to cover that eye until they could break the habit of trying to use both eyes. At ranges over about 100 meters (give or take), human eyes simply aren't far enough apart to contribute greatly to depth perception, and visual references (the car or doorway the opponent is standing near, for example) are much better for use in estimating distance.
  • Lieutenant-General Sir Adrian Carton de Wiart was an Anglo-Belgian aristocrat, soldier and diplomat, was wounded seven times during the First World War, losing his left eye to a bullet and having his hand so badly mangled he bit his own fingers off. He went on to win a Victoria Cross at La Boiselle, afterwards saying, "Frankly I enjoyed the war." He spent the inter-war period with the British military mission to Poland, fighting off Red Army cavalry with a revolver at Warsaw. When WWII rolled around he escaped Poland just ahead of the Wehrmacht, led an amphibious assault on Norway and was transferred to the Mediterranean just in time to be shot down and captured by the Italians, escaping five times despite being over sixty and speaking no Italian. Released as part of Italy's surrender in '43 he was then sent as Churchill's personal representative to China, where he called out Mao Zedong to his face for holding back from fighting the Japanese, in favor of fighting the Nationalists. He did all this looking much like Brigadier Lethbridge-Stuart's evil counterpart, with a black eyepatch and a black moustache. A badass mofo in anyone's book and one of those crazy career soldiers Britain seemed to turn out like a production line prior to WWII.
  • James Joyce often wore one. He was troubled by eyesight problems for much of his life, and underwent numerous eye surgeries.
  • Chilean TV host and Intrepid Reporter Santiago Pavlovic lost an eye in a childhood accident. He now wears a spiffy eyepatch to cover it.
  • Russian field marshal Mikhail Illarionovich Kutuzov, widely considered the best of Suvorov's pupils, got to wear one after his right eye was injured by a musket ball (twice) and he started to get splitting headaches from its use. It also contributed to the myth that he was one-eyed.
  • War Journalist Marie Colvin lost sight in one of her eyes due to a being caught in the blast of Sri-Lankan Army Rocket Propelled Grenade in 2001. She took to wearing an eyepatch after losing the sight in her eye due to the damage done to it.
  • British nuclear bomber crews were issued with eyepatches for fear that in a war they'd be blinded by all the atomic weapons going off. When one eye was blinded by a nuclear flash, they were supposed to switch over to the other, and hopefully there'd be a crewmember still able to see by the time they reached their target (returning home was not an issue, as there wouldn't have been enough fuel anyway).
  • Eyepatches are frequently used to correct amblyopia (lazy eye), especially in children.
  • Economist Richard W. Rahn, a senior fellow at the libertarian think tank the Cato Institute, wears an eyepatch over his right eye.
  • The Austrian general Adam Albert von Neipperg lost his right eye to bayonet wounds at nineteen, in 1794 and wore an eyepatch after that. Historians mentioning him in passing often make a point of saying that this took nothing off his charm, and indeed, he became the lover and eventually morganatic husband of Marie-Louise, Napoleon's second wife.
  • Ana de Mendoza, a Spanish noblewoman of the 16th century famous for her beauty and court intrigues, wore an eyepatch over her right eye.
  • Even though duelling was outlawed in Prussia in 1851, and the rest of Germany upon its' founding as a result, German university fraternities still practised fencing duels, the idea being to slash the opponants' face in order to win. The scars were worn as a badge of honour, likewise a missing eye. Thus explaning why almost all fictional aristocratic villains of Germanic heritage would either sport a facial scar on the left of their face(Schmisse), or an eyepatch.
  • A subverted example comes in the Oath Keepers' founder, Stewart Rhodes. In 1993, he reportedly dropped a loaded handgun and it shot him in the face, blinding him in his left eye.

 
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Alternative Title(s): Eyepatch Of Doom

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Tristan as an Assassin

To save his master Teodoro from assassination, Tristan poses as a hitman himself, and puts on an eyepatch to accentuate the badass image.

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