About

Batman Haircut Guy refers to a photograph of a teenager with long, emo-like bangs covering his face down to his nose. Spread on Discord since July 2022, the photograph went viral on Twitter in September 2022 after a viral post that jokingly compared it to the character L from Death Note.

Origin

Prior to July 6th, 2022, an unknown user posted a photograph of a teenager with long, emo-like bangs covering his face down to his nose but leaving his eyes open (shown below). On July 6th, 2022, Twitter^[1] user @tumamaentangawn made the earliest found post of the image. On July 7th, an unknown user posted the image to /r/teenagers,^[2] claiming it was "face reveal." The post gained 80 upvotes.

Spread

On September 9th, 2022, Twitter^[3] user @__Poke__ tweeted a request for users to post anime characters that look like them. In the thread, Twitter^[4] user @TopperssonBR tweeted the Batman Haircut Guy alongside an image of character L from the anime series Death Note. The tweet gained over 4,700 retweets and 20,800 likes in one month (shown below).

Following the post, the image achieved viral popularity on Twitter. For example, on September 13th, Twitter^[5] user @nescartridges tweeted an image of a Mii character based on the photograph, with the post gaining over 2,800 retweets and 38,000 likes in one month (shown below, left). A My Reaction to That Information reaction image based on the photograph also saw use. For example, on September 15th, Twitter user @OvOBrezzzy tweeted a screenshot of a message exchange that received over 330 retweets and 15,100 likes in three weeks (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Templates

Search Interest

External References