Opaque Lenses



Glasses generally allow people to see out of and into the eyes of the wearer. The subjects of this trope, however, have glasses that are reminiscent of the mirror windows of crime-show examination rooms - they can see you, but you can't see them. This is not a threatening gesture like Scary Shiny Glasses. It may be permanent, but it isn't silly Nerd Glasses.

Perhaps the artist was lazy, but that's not what this is about. Characters with Opaque Lenses are usually hiding something. Maybe they're just emotionless - their hidden eyes, the so-called "window to the soul," hammering home the fact that you have no idea what they are thinking. Maybe they are hiding Glowing Eyes or Red Eyes, Take Warning. Maybe they are disguising themselves. But regardless of the reason, when you look at them you get the feeling like you're missing something.

See also: Opaque Nerd Glasses, Scary Shiny Glasses. Compare Sinister Shades, which have the same effect, but you expect it because, well, they're actually supposed to hide the character's eyes.

Anime and Manga

 * Umino and Princess Diamond of Sailor Moon both have opaque glasses. Ami gets them when she's wearing her glasses and is either overconfident or excited.
 * Paul Wan from GetBackers, as seen above, is a bizarre example, if only because his sunglasses are actually opaque. He is hiding his, but used contact lenses for the same purpose, so who knows? Oddly enough, Ban has a pair just like Paul's, but they're normal.
 * From Loveless, Ritsu's eyes are occasionally visible in the manga behind his Stoic Spectacles. In the anime, however, they're only hidden when Ritsu is in Scary Shiny Glasses mode.
 * Yomi's glasses go from transparent to opaque (a light blue) for a few different reasons: annoyance, dumbfoundedness, sneaky idea, uh, that "Limiter override!" thing, y'know.
 * Yuki Nagato has glasses that do this... at least,.
 * Hazuki in Ojamajo Doremi, usually when she's upset or embarrassed.
 * Or when the artists consider her less important.
 * Stein from Soul Eater, most of the time.
 * Between this and Scary Shiny Glasses, you very rarely see Kobayashi's eyes in The Law of Ueki. After he gets sent to Hell as punishment for saving Ueki from being killed by Robert, he isn't wearing glasses for a while, and when he starts wearing them again, you can see his eyes more often. Not that that's necessarily a good thing...
 * Rider in Fate/stay night apparently has no trouble seeing through purple blinders that are roughly an inch thick and cover about 40% of her face. At one point she's asked to take them off... so that people can see her face, not the other way around.
 * Inui of The Prince of Tennis, to the point where it becomes a Running Gag that no one ever sees his eyes. The height of the gag comes when he breaks his glasses during a match, so we're expecting to finally see his eyes-- and then it turns out he has a large case full of pairs of spare glasses. Rikkaidai's Yagyuu also qualifies for this trope.

Comic Books

 * The Corinthian's shades might be these on occasion, depending on the artist. They're either Sunglasses At Night drawn in fairly realistic style to hide his teeth-eyes, or stylised black circles on his face that hide his eyes entirely.
 * The original Ventriloquist in Batman comics, Batman the Animated Series and The Batman. The intent (combined with his bald head and inexpressive mouth) seems to be to make him as much The Blank as possible without it looking odd; Scarface is the character who emotes.

Fan Works

 * A rare literary example in With Strings Attached. Because Ringo is walking around with his eyes closed all the time, he has black obsidian glasses made for himself to hide that little fact. However, he loses the glasses when they're turned into living creatures by Brox's life spell.

Literature

 * Zaphod Beeblebrox has a variation where his glasses are opaque, period, when they sense danger. If you can't see it, it can't frighten you, after all.
 * Crowley from Good Omens hides the fact that he's a demon with reptilian eyes with a pair of sunglasses.

Newspaper Comics

 * Marcie from Peanuts. She occasionally had to Glasses Pull to reveal that she was rolling her eyes, perhaps as a subtle Lampshade Hanging.
 * Jason Fox and any other nerdy character in FoxTrot (e.g., Morton Goldthwait). Non-nerds who wear glasses, such as Jason's grandmother, don't have opaque lenses.
 * Dilbert, his mother, Dogbert, and Wally.
 * Agnes and her grandmother.
 * Any glasses wearers in The Far Side and many an imitator thereof.
 * Milo Bloom and most other glasses wearers in Bloom County.
 * Lance Fusco in The Fusco Brothers. Lampshaded: "How can you tell what kind of eyes I'm making, Gloria? I've got my opaque one-way Lance Fusco glasses on."

Video Games

 * In Monster Rancher 1, at first the man you talk with to book training for your monster has opaque glasses and a distant, impersonal air. Once you pass the milestone of getting a monster to class B, his glasses lose the opaque look and he seems friendlier. Get to class S, and he starts to greet you with a deferential bow of the head.
 * Boss from Catherine.

Web Comics

 * Everyone who wears glasses in A Miracle of Science has blank white lenses, although the most prominent example, Dr. Haas, simply has Scary Shiny Glasses.
 * Parodied in the webcomic Real Life: When Cliff is introduced, he has see-through glasses despite the fact that the only other character in the strip wearing glasses, Dave, had opaque lenses. The very next strip had Cliff asking Dave about this, prompting Dave to reveal that they aren't just glasses, but rather something akin to Geordi La Forge's VISOR.
 * Tedd from El Goonish Shive.
 * Dave in Narbonic, until
 * Everyone who wears sunglasses in Homestuck - Dave, his brother, Terezi, and Equius - makes use of this trope. Characters who just wear normal glasses have visible eyes, unless they're using a computer display function.
 * In Impure Blood, worn to hide Glowing Eyes.

Western Animation

 * Professor Frink in The Simpsons and Professor Hubert Farnsworth in Futurama.
 * Dale from King of the Hill.
 * Curly from Hey Arnold.
 * Agent Six from Generator Rex
 * Parodied on South Park with Cartman's police officer outfit. It includes a pair of shades which ALWAYS reflect a mountain sunset, no matter what he is actually looking at.

Real Life

 * Almost Real Life example: Some people very rarely clean their glasses, and another person (Usually a parent.) will tell them almost always this line when they need to be cleaned: "Your glasses look opaque!"