Eyes Out of Sight

See no creepy!

This is for a character whose eyes are always concealed, whether they're wearing shades, Opaque Lenses, an Eye-Obscuring Hat, or a mop of hair. It doesn't matter what they wear to cover up their vision, whether it's shades, a hat, a mask, etc. Point is that their eyes are never seen, so we never learn what their entire face looks like. Sometimes this is done to make the character mysterious or conceal the character's weird eyes. Other times, it's done to invoke an emo look.

Please note that this is not about how hiding their eyes expresses a certain emotion, whether it's angst or shyness. While that can be a bonus for this trope, it's not what it's mainly about. It's about a character who always has their eyes covered and they are rarely, if ever, seen. Also note that this is for characters who regularly appear, so minor characters don't count.

In Japanese media, obscured eyes (usually by bangs) is often used as a stand-in for being "generic" and can be used for the Protagonist of video games (including Eroge). This lead to the meme of any such character as having 'hentai protagonist hair'.

A Super-Trope to Hidden Eyes, in which the eyes are obscured only to show angst or terror. Can overlap with Eyes Always Shut (in which a character never opens their eyes) and The Faceless (in which a character's entire face is obscured). Also compare Never Bareheaded, which is the same thing, but with a character never revealing their head instead. Might fall under The Unreveal if a character is about to show what their eyes look like, only for them to be out of view.

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Examples:

Advertising

• An animated Partnership For A Drug Free America from the 90s featured a kid named Davey, whose eyes are always covered by his yellow baseball cap.
• The Energizer Bunny's eyes are usually hidden by his Cool Shades (and in the case of the commercial parodying The Lone Ranger, the Ranger's mask). Since the transition to CGi, the Bunny's sunglasses have become an Expressive Mask of sorts, eliminating the need for proper eyes to be seen. Poked fun at in a Holiday 2016 ad, where the Bunny takes off his sunglasses to reveal another pair underneath. That being said, there have been official plush toys of the Bunny that give him eyes (a given, as they'd look awkward otherwise), but its inconsistent as to whether they're beady or traditional cartoon-style eyes.

Anime & Manga

• The 100 Girlfriends Who Really, Really, Really, Really, Really Love You: Meme always hides her eyes under her bangs as she suffers from crippling social anxiety and can't stand for anyone to see them. It's so important to her that even in dangerous situations if there's any risk of her bangs being blown up (such as via wind or gravity) she'll keep a hand there to hold them down, personal safety be damned. It's implied that beneath her bangs she's actually incredibly beautiful... but given her hatred of attention, that's just all the more reason for her to hide herself.
• Bobobo-bo Bo-bobo:
  • Besides some flashback as a child, the titular character has always worn his Cool Shades and never removed them.
  • One of the Hair-Hunt Troops from one hundred years ago, Nihiru/Ringo, has purple hair with bangs that covers his eyes.
• Bocchi the Rock!: Played for laughs with Hitori's dad Naoki. His eyes are never seen due to him either being seen from the back, or something conveniently covering them, like his camera or his other daughter's arms.
• Digimon:
  • Often, Digimon with a fully human appearance have their eyes covered by something and we don't see what's under it. Aversions often have their face obscured by a Cool Mask instead. Examples include Angemon, who has a helmet that covers up his eyes and we never see what his eyes look like underneath it, Angewomon, who is Angemon's Distaff Counterpart and wears her helmet the same way as Angemon, and Fairimon, who wears a visor that covers her eyes and never takes it off.
  • Digimon Ghost Game: Angoramon's bangs usually cover his eyes. In fact, on the rare occasion that his eyes are visible under them, it's a sign that something's very wrong.
• Fairy Tail: Capricorn always wears opaque Cool Shades, and apart from brief moments when his eyes bulge so big out of anger that they're partially visible, he's never seen without them.
• Kirby: Right Back at Ya!: Tuff has bangs that obscure his eyes, and we never see what's underneath them.
• Jujutsu Kaisen: Jujutsu Sorcerers cover their eyes to stealthily observe Cursed Spirits, as they often get violent if they know they're being watched. Satoru Gojo also does this, but for a different reason.
• Moriarty the Patriot: Blind Von Herder always wears a blindfold around his eyes. There's even an omake joke where someone takes it off and he's wearing another one underneath it.
• One Piece: Donquixote Doflamingo's eyes are always hidden behind his Cool Shades. The reason why has yet to be revealed, but a Flash Back shows that this was already the case in his childhood, and when a reader asked what was under his sunglasses, the author dodged the question by answering that he wore another identical pair of sunglasses. Whenever they are damaged in battle and the one time he is seen taking them off, alone in a private room, his eyes are conveniently out of frame, closed, or covered by his hand.
• Pokémon: The Series:
  • Before it was caught by Lana and given an Important Haircut, Sandy the Eevee in Pokémon the Series: Sun & Moon had fur that covered its eyes and occasionally gave it trouble seeing.
  • In Pokémon Horizons: The Series, Nidothing's real life identity Dot has a purple mop covering her face. When she does pull up her bangs, her eyes have almost a permanently bored Tsurime look with thick eyebrows.
• Princess Jellyfish: Jiji's eyes never show up through her opaque glasses. Bamba and Mayaya have eye obscuring bangs, but in the manga, Mayaya's eyes show up in a few dramatic moments.
  • In the manga, Mayaya explains she hides her eyes because when she was a kid, they earned her the nickname "contract killer" from the other children. She is forced to pull her bangs back when she becomes Tsukimi's model. For everyone's surprise, Mayaya's ferocious eyes are stunning, but she doesn't believe it when they tell her that.
  • In chapter 84, Jiji takes off her glasses when she volunteers to replace Kuranosuke in the fashion show, showing her expressive black eyes. Bamba follows suit by pulling her curly hair back. Her eyes are big and clear (unluckily, the scene is in black and white, so its not possible to know their color.
• Benten no Chou from Usagi-chan de Cue!! always wears goggles that circle his head, and have Opaque Lenses. This eyewear remains on his face whether he's in human form or in dog form. To compensate for his eyes being obscured, Chou has an Expressive Accessory hachimaki that tends to spell out his thoughts and feelings at the moment.
• Zombie Land Saga: Kotaro Tatsumi never takes off his sunglasses. None of the main cast have ever seen his full face, and any scene or flashback that hints to his eyes will always obscure them. It layers onto his already Mysterious Past.

Asian Animation

• Banzi's Secret Diary: Banzi's shy boyfriend Hoyong deliberately has his hair obscuring his eyes.
• Lamput: One of the soccer players in "Soccer Punch" has hair that goes over his eyes, preventing him from seeing and making it hard for him to play soccer. Eventually, Lamput pulls back his hair, and he can see again.

Comic Books

• Since his helmet also contains a shades-like mask, the titular Judge Dredd is never seen from the nose up, as neither his head nor eyes have been disclosed.
• Preacher: Cassidy never, ever removes his sunglasses. In the finale, it's shown to be because they're hideously bloodshot.
• Secret Path (2016): The Sinister Minister from the Residential School that Chanie Wendjak fled from is never shown when his face is visible. The closest we get is a shot that, while it shows the lower half of his face, still has a branch obscuring his eyes.
• Cyclops of the X-Men usually wears his visor or glasses or shuts his eyes to control his Eye Beams. When he doesn't, his eyes aren't visible through the beams.

Comic Strips

• Beetle Bailey: In addition to being Never Bareheaded, the titular Beetle Bailey wears either an Army soft cap or a helmet while at Camp Swampy, both of which cover his eyes. This doesn't seem to obscure his vision when Sarge is looking for him. The only time Beetle's eyes have been seen is shortly before enlisting in the Army, when his girlfriend asked him to remove his porkpie hat. She took one look, then told him to put the hat back on.
• Calvin and Hobbes: Moe, the class bully, always has his eyes covered by his bangs.
• Crabgrass: Kyle, Kevin's older brother, always has his eyes obscured by his long black hair. One comic Miles even states he had no idea Kyle even has eyes.
• Knights of the Dinner Table: Newt, of the Black Hands, always has his eyes obscured by his fringe.
• Peanuts: Marcie always wears opaque glasses that obscure her eyes, and is never once seen without them.
• The Phantom: The title character wears an Irisless Eye Mask Of Mystery in his costumed guise and always wears sunglasses in his civilian identity as Kit Walker. Jungle lore says that it is death to see his unmasked face. While he doesn't wear a mask or glasses in bed — suggesting at the very least that his wife is immune from the curse — his eyes are obscured by shadow then.

Fan Works

• In Through Her Eyes, Ruby Rose sports a pair of tinted goggles at all times. Since her Grimm eyes cause an overwhelming fight-or-flight response that result in people either fleeing/freezing in terror or attacking her in perceived self-defense, wearing goggles is the only way she can safely interact with others, including her own family.

Film — Animation

• Scooby-Doo Meets the Boo Brothers: Farquard, the man servant to the late Colonel Beaureguard, wore sunglasses throughout the movie, but this trope was only subverted for 3 seconds at the beginning of the movie when he did take them off.
• Trolls World Tour: Barb's drummer, Riff, always has his eyes obscured by his beanie cap. The only time they're exposed in some way is when he peeks his right eye out of the beanie.

Film — Live-Action

• The Blues Brothers: Jake and Elwood are never seen without their trademark sunglasses until Jake removes his at the climax while pleading with his M16-toting ex-fiancee. Elwood never takes his off at all except for a deleted scene (where he was still wearing safety glasses).
• Just like his comic book counterpart, the titular Dredd is never seen without his helmet, which covers both his eyes and head.
• Todd in the Shadows' kayfabe is always having a Face Framed in Shadow. In Suburban Knights, in order to preserve this while walking around in daylight, he wears a black cloth over his eyes and under his hood, only showing his mouth. An attempt from one of his team members to remove it gets a gun to their face.

Literature

• Bad Kitty: Stinky Kitty has eye obscuring bangs and in "Happy Birthday, Bad Kitty", it's noted that no one ever dares to see what his eyes look like under his hair because he smells so terrible.
• Some of the Mr. Men characters, such as Mr. Silly, Mr. Nonsense and Little Miss Scatterbrain, wear hats that obscure their eyes.
• Sprawl Trilogy: As part of her extensive combat augmentations, Molly Millions has had non-retractable one-way mirrors implanted over her eyes, so that nobody ever sees the latter. In Neuromancer, Case constantly wonders about her eye color — which remains an open mystery in the end, even after one of Molly's shades is broken in a fight.^note Her eye underneath is also injured and so swollen that the iris cannot be seen. Symbolically, the mirror shades represent Molly's inability to let anyone get close to her, emotionally, since the eyes are the windows of the soul and she uses technology to actively prevent anyone from peering into hers.
• Skazz, one of three students in the High Energy Magic Building of Unseen University in Hogfather is noted to have a hairstyle that goes down to his shoulders all the way around. It's only because of his nose sticking out that Ridcully is reasonably sure he's facing the right way.

Music

• Gorillaz: Noodle wore long bangs in the media surrounding Demon Days (Album) (known together as "Phase 2"), hiding her eyes most of the time. While she didn't possess them for Plastic Beach (which were given to her robot replica Cyborg Noodle), she had a face-concealing mask in their place. The bangs have returned occasionally for later albums, but they're nowhere near as omnipresent as they were in Phase 2.

Puppet Shows

• Fraggle Rock: Boober's eyes are ostensibly hidden under his hat and shock of red hair. In reality, the Boober puppet has no eyes at all. This was the third major Muppet character Dave Goelz had performed with either hidden or no eyes, following Zoot and Bunsen Honeydew.
• Sesame Street: Barkley the dog has long bangs and his eyes have never been seen.
• Didi from Shining Time Station always has her eyes hidden by her bangs.

Tabletop Games

• In Duel Masters, creatures that look like cute anime girls often have their eyes covered by a mop of hair (example). The only exceptions are creatures of the Outrage race.
• In Nomine: Nybbas, Demon Prince of the Media, is famous for his reflective glasses, always flickering with static, that he never takes off. No demon in Hell remembers what his eyes even look like.

Video Games

• In AFK Arena, Cecilia and Shemira always wear a blindfold. Both characters are blind; the former born that way, and the latter having literally cried her eyes out.
• As a stylistic choice, every human character in Darkest Dungeon has eyes framed in shadows. The only ones who have visible eyes are the abominations that have too many to hide, the Crimson Court vampires who have giant insectoid eyes as a side effect of their Curse, and the Gibbering Prophet who plucked them out and is carrying them in his hand.
• Deltarune: Kris' eyes are never seen until The Stinger, where one eye appears glowing bright red. It can be seen again in Chapter 2 for a brief moment when Kris & Susie are leaping back into the Dark World, and once more at the very end, right as they open another Dark Fountain.
• All human units and enemies in Dead Ahead Zombie Warfare have their eyes concealed in some way, either with shadows coming from hats and helmets or eyewear. They're only revealed once they die.
• In the F-Zero series, while many of the racers are like this, the most notable is protagonist Captain Falcon. The visor on his helmet has white triangles where his eyes should be, and in F-Zero GX and the Super Smash Bros. series, his eyes don't even have textures, that portion of his head's texture hidden in shadow.
• Fuga: Melodies of Steel has Wappa Charlotte, a loudmouth who's eyes are always covered by her thick, curly hair, and even with alternate costumes, they are always obstructed by helmets, hats, or thick, opaque glasses. She reveals to Britz that she enforces this trope so people can't tell if she's really sleeping or not while on duty.
• Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas:
  • Ryder's eyes are never seen since he never removes his sunglasses.
  • Wu Zi Mu is a justified example. Missions after his introduction, CJ learns that Woozie is blind, and thus Woozie always wears sunglasses.
• Idol Manager: The Player Character has bangs that completely hide their eyes regardless of gender.
• The King of Fighters: Shermie's eyes are always obscured by her hair. Some official artwork◊ manages to combine this with Hidden Eyes, somehow.
• In Potion Permit, Victor's eyes are always hidden under his bangs, adding to his creepiness. They're not even shown in his portrait, making it look like he doesn't have eyes at all.
• Puyo Puyo: Maguro Sasaki's eyes are always covered with his hair. Only the other characters know what they look like, and they have never been shown to us. We do know, however, that they are able to attract anyone of any kind, as revealed in his story in 20th Anniversary.
• Resident Evil: Albert Wesker always wears sunglasses, up until the fifth game in the franchise.
• Saints Row: Johnny Gat almost always wears sunglasses whenever he's doing work for the Third Street Saints. His eyes are at their most invisible in the third and fourth games, due to the Art Evolution improving the graphics, whereas before, his sunglasses were just transparent enough or low on his face enough for the player to see his eyes. According to the writers, Johnny wears prescription sunglasses, which means wearing them actually is beneficial for his eyesight. Which speaks volumes about how awesome Johnny is.
• Shantae and the Seven Sirens: The warp room attendant always has her bangs covering her eyes.
• Super Paper Mario: Nastasia is almost always seen with opaque glasses on. The one time they're knocked off, her eyes are closed until she puts them back on.
• Team Fortress 2: The Engineer is always wearing welding goggles except when the player selects other cosmetics that replace it. There is no in-game option to reveal his eyes. If the Engineer wears the not-at-all eye-obscuring Reader's Choice eyeglasses, he wears them over his welding goggles.
• Them's Fightin' Herds: Vetr's eyes, and most of his facial features, are hidden away by his prodigiously thick facial hair.
• The art style of Valiant Hearts covers the eyes of adults to show that they have seen tne horrors of the world. Children's eyes are therefore uncovered to display their innocence. In the sequel, the African-Americans are similarly drawn with eyes shown because they're optimistic and eager to prove themselves. Once James learns that his brother Freddie wasn't killed in action, but by racists back at home, his eyes are cynically obscured.
• WarioWare: Several characters, such as Jimmy T. (and by extension, his entire family), Orbulon, Dr. Crygor and 18-Volt, have their eyes hidden behind glasses (or in the case of Dr. Crygor, a visor) and are rarely, if never shown. Orbulon's eyes however, were barely visible in one cutscene in Twisted, (and his eyes can be shown in their entirety if the glasses are removed via hacking).

Visual Novels

• The Great Ace Attorney: The eyes of Jezaille Brett are always obscured by either the rim of her hat or the mask she holds in her hand.

Web Animation

• Happy Tree Friends: The Mole, who always wears sunglasses, and Cro-Marmot, whose eyes are obscured by his hair.

Webcomics

• Crow Time: Edwin has long bangs covering their eyes.
• El Goonish Shive: Tedd and Edward Verres both wear opaque glasses at the start of the comic, which hide their eyes. Tedd's eyes get revealed a year into the run (2003), at which point Tedd reveals he only wears his opaque glasses to hide his "girly" eyes, which he got bullied for. He later stops doing this, since he has accepted his androgynous appearance. Mr. Verres's eyes wouldn't get revealed until 2022 after his glasses got knocked off in a battle with Liam Tyrantslayer, at which point it was revealed he had heterochromia.
• JL8: Young Bruce Wayne and Hal Jordan both wear domino masks that hide their eyes. While Hal would eventually reveal his eyes during the camping trip arc, Bruce has yet to be seen without his mask on (even when sleeping).
• In Lightning Made of Owls, Delkin's eyes are always hidden, sometimes by bangs, sometimes by opaque eyewear of some kind.
• The Majestic 12 in Trying Human have eyes hidden in various ways (bangs, Sinister Shades, a cloth with an eye symbol, etc.), except 6, who's an artificial lifeform, and 12, who's new. Except when he acts in cruel, inhumane, man-in-black ways, shadows or his own hair hide his eyes. Conversely, when 8, who normally has bangs, acts human, moral or vulnerable, her eyes peek out from behind the hair. Glassner, Herr Doktor of the Area 51, is wearing Sinister Shades. Hiddenness of eyes seems to symbolise inhumanity, in short, although Pigment, one half of a Battle Couple vigilante duo and an indisputable good gal, wears a pair of pink goggles when out heroing. But that might be to protect both her eyes and her identity.
• Wonderlab: The Penitent Girl and A Party Everlasting both have long hair that obscure their entire faces. With the latter, the most we ever get to see of their face is a single eye.
• Yokoka's Quest: Kalliv's eyes aren't can't be seen beneath his hair while in demon form, though in mouse form they're fully visible. When Copycat shapeshifts into Kalliv, he notes that his eyesight is awful, even without any hair in the way, while also revealing to the readers what Kalliv's eyes would look like uncovered.

Western Animation

• Animaniacs: Dr Scratchansniff's eyes are always covered by his opaque glasses.
• Codename: Kids Next Door: Played with since we see their eyes from time to time, but all members of Sector V hide their eyes most of the time in different ways: Numbah 1 with his sunglasses, Numbah 2 with his goggles, Numbah 3 by keeping them shut, Numbah 4 with his hair, and Numbah 5 with her hat.
• Neither Eustace nor Muriel in Courage the Cowardly Dog have their eyes revealed behind their glasses, and the rare times each of them do take them off, their eyes are always shut tight.
• The Blue Falcon from Dynomutt, Dog Wonder, due to his beak hood. Sometimes, it looks like he has empty eye sockets!
• In Ed, Edd n Eddy, Lee Kanker's eyes are almost never seen behind her curly red hair. In The Big Picture Show, a quick shot shows her with three eyes, though that might have been an animation error.
• The Epic Tales of Captain Underpants: Bo Hweemuth has long bangs, and we've never once seen his eyes underneath his hair, so it's unknown if he has the same Black Bead Eyes as everyone else.
• Futurama: The few times Professor Farnsworth takes off his Opaque Nerd Glasses, he is invariably facing away from the audience. According to Mom, they’re milky white in color.
• Blendin Blandin from Gravity Falls is never once seen with his opaque glasses off. The one time he took them off when Bill Cipher possessed him, he had Bill-stylized eyes, and the instant Bill leaves his body, the glasses are immediately back on.
• Recurring character "Purple Socks" from Harriet the Spy is almost always seen with his bangs covering his eyes, with only a few times where we actually get to see his eyes (and those times are always brief).
• Curly in Hey Arnold! wears glasses in which the lenses completely obscure his eyes. He was once shown without them on in "Curly's Girl", though it's unclear whether they're really what his eyes regularly look like or if it's just Puppy-Dog Eyes that only show up occasionally depending on a character's mood.
• Multi Man of The Impossibles hides his eyes behind sheepdog-like bangs.
• Jelly Jamm: Ongo has eye obscuring bangs and, with the exception of when he looks through binoculars in "Queen's Birthday" and "A Day at the Races" and we see his pupils, we never see the rest of his eyes under that hair.
• The titular Johnny Bravo never reveals his eyes from behind his sunglasses, and in the rare instances they're removed, he either has Wingding Eyes or uses one of his beefy arms to cover his entire face until he puts his glasses back on. The closest we would ever get to seeing his eyes is the crossover episode with Scooby-Doo, where he and Velma accidentally switch glasses.
• Eugly from Kaeloo, as her bangs cover her eyes. They are seen for a few brief seconds in Episode 82, but usually kept covered.
• Legend Quest: Coyolxauhqui, the Big Bad of Masters of Myth, has her headdress always covering her eyes, though her nose and mouth are always uncovered.
• The Loud House:
  • Pictured atop this page is Lucy Loud, who always has her eyes covered by her hair. Even when she was shown as a baby several times, she either wore an Eye-Obscuring Hat or already had her bangs grown. Considering the reason why her parents let her hair grow out as said in one episode, her eyes must have been creepy enough for them to not want to look at.
  • Various other characters have their hair covering where their eyes should be as well, including Mazzy, Hank, Mick Swagger and Lucy's one-off animal counterpart Bella from "White Hare" (who has the unusual Furry Female Mane whereas every other animal character from the episode either has no representation of hair, a tuft of head fur, or uses their Ears as Hair).
• Sam the Sheepdog from Looney Tunes has this look going, potentially making him look more intimidating to Ralph, although his (completely normal) eyes do sometimes get exposed at certain times during the show. Justified, as this is what old English sheepdogs (Sam's presumed breed) actually look like.
• The Raccoons: Schaeffer the Dog's eyes are always covered by his bangs.
• On The Ricky Gervais Show, Karl's girlfriend Susanne always has her bangs covering her eyes whenever her face is onscreen.
• Shaun the Sheep: The Farmer's eyes cannot be seen behind his glasses. Whenever he's without them, his eyes are always closed.
• Teen Titans (2003): Robin constantly wears his domino mask, even when on a date or hanging out with the other Titans, which hides his eyes. In his one significant costume change in Teen Titans: Trouble in Tokyo, he wears sunglasses instead.
• Unikitty!: Hawkodile always wears Cool Shades. It is shown in "Action Forest" that he used to have bangs when he was younger, and when Eagleator steals his shades from him in that same episode, we only see him from behind before he covers his eyes with a blindfold. It's said that Hawkodile is so used to wearing the shades that his eyes can no longer tolerate the sunlight.
• VeggieTales invokes this with the design of several characters, like Pa Grape, Mr. Lunt, and Grandpa George. However, because of the art style of the show, they pull this off by not rendering the characters with eyes at all, leading to the occasional Lampshade Hanging.

Real Life

• There are a number of dog breeds that have fur growing down from their heads obscuring their eyes, such as the Puli, the Komondor, the Briard, and the Old English Sheepdog. Notably, these four breeds are guarding or herding dogs, and hair over their eyes protects them from sunlight, rain, and dirt during their long time spent in the pastures.
• The Highland Cattle often has hair growing down over its eyes.

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