What Is Up With Children’s Television and Unibrows?

Perhaps Bert has been scarred by Ernie's overzealous tweezing.

It is no secret that I had a truly spectacular unibrow as a child/adolescent. Chances are, if you meet me at a party I will find a way to work it into the conversation in the first five minutes–less if I’m drunk.

It’s also no secret that Frida Kahlo is the patron saint of unibrows, and pretty much the only human female ever to have pulled one off without playing a villainous Russian caricature in a slapstick comedy (ahem, Dodgeball). As far as men go, you’ve got former USSR leader Leonid Brezhnev, pre-presidency George W. Bush, and pretty much every member of Oasis. But the most monobrow-ed sector of the pop culture population exists in children’s television. Say what now?

Obviously there’s Sesame Street’s Bert, who rocked the uni back before it was cool–possibly to make up for the fact that Ernie had no eyebrows at all. And it must have been hella soothing to toddlers, because in the past few decades, at least six other cartoon or puppet characters have sported the look. Oh, and they’re all evil. To wit:

Baby Gerald and Groundskeeper Willie from The Simpsons

One is Maggie’s arch-nemesis. The other is an angry Scotsman who is forced to perform demeaning labor, like plunging a toilet with his own arm. I rest my case.

Helga Pataki from Hey Arnold!

A schoolyard bully who rejects all trappings of stereotypical femininity (giant pink bow notwithstanding). Shares last name with a certain boring former governor of New York.

Squilliam Fancyson from SpongeBob SquarePants

Snooty, penis-nosed Arch-nemesis of Squidward Tentacles. Detecting a pattern yet? (Hint: it’s not penis-shaped noses).

King Bob from Recess

OK, just look at that kid. He is obviously a douche.

Brobee from Yo, Gabba Gabba!

I have only watched one episode of Yo, Gabba Gabba! and thus cannot distinguish at all between the characters–I know that there’s a skinny black guy who dresses like one of Rainbow Brite’s Color Kids and something that looks like a big red dildo with one eye, but that’s about it. I want to like Brobee, because he reminds me of my favorite socks, but his unibrow makes me think he probably sucks. I mean, even Bert was a curmudgeon whose life was basically structured around collecting paper clips, making oatmeal, and watching pigeons. And let’s not forget the total fucking sociopath known as Yosemite Sam.

It’s hard for me, as a person who spent much of her youth looking like Brooke Shields on Rogaine, not to see this as covert propaganda being used to teach our children to fear those who don’t frequent the threading salon. Then again, the characters with no eyebrows (Ernie, Elmo, Mickey Mouse, that big red dildo, whose name, it turns out, is Muno) are pretty dim, so maybe it’s a wash.

Tune in next time, when I investigate  beloved children’s characters and the drugs they were probably on.