Hairbun
| Hairbun | |
|---|---|
 | |
| First appearance | 337: Post Office Showdown |
| Appearances | 107 |
- For a list of comics, see Comics featuring Hairbun.
Hairbun is a stick figure character in xkcd. Like most characters in xkcd, she does not necessarily represent the same person from comic to comic. She is distinguished by her hair, set up in a bun. She can have several variations of her hair style, and occasionally uses glasses.
Appearences[edit]
Hairbun appeared two weeks in a row in the spring of 2015 (1504: Opportunity and 1507: Metaball) and was recognized as a "new" character at that time, though she had been used several times prior to then.
However, after comic 1500 she has appeared fourteen times from 1504: Opportunity to 1756: I'm With Her (which was the second comic in a row with her). This is more than once every 20th comic, compared to only twenty times before comic 1500 which is only once every 75th comic, so there was a good reason for why she was not "discovered" before.
Characteristics[edit]
She is not the same character from comic to comic. She is mainly just another woman that Randall can use when he wishes to give a woman a specific characteristic so to set her aside from the more commonly used women, Megan and Ponytail. Often, she is depicted together with both Megan and Ponytail proving this point. She has, for instance, represented the mother of both Megan and Cueball, see the list below under the list of Hairbuns drawn with glasses.
With glasses[edit]
In her first appearance, 337: Post Office Showdown, she is drawn with glasses.
- She also wears glasses in 2472: Fuzzy Blob, 1772: Startup Opportunity, 1756: I'm With Her, 1637: Salt Mine, 1110: Click and Drag, 1088: Five Years, 1052: Every Major's Terrible, 872: Fairy Tales, 863: Major in the Universe, 835: Tree, 566: Matrix Revisited and in 410: Math Paper
- In 835: Tree she portrays Cueball's mother and/or the wife of another version of Cueball.
- In 872: Fairy Tales she portrays Megan's mother, a sleepy math professor.
- She wears sunglasses (as Trinity) in 566: Matrix Revisited.
- In total, up to "I'm With Her", she has used glasses nine times.
- Her first appearance without glasses was in her second appearance, 378: Real Programmers. In the recent comics (past no. 1500), this is her most prevalent appearance.
Curly hair[edit]
In 1645: Toasts, she is drawn with curly hair.
Curly hair and trailing hair[edit]
In 703: Honor Societies, 708: Sex Dice, 1511: Spice Girl, 1601: Isolation and in every instance in 1608: Hoverboard, her hair is curly and has some kind of trailing hair. Since her main distinguishing characteristic is her hair bun, these comics are included.
Real person[edit]
Similarly to Cueball, Hairbun can also represent real people from time to time. For Hairbun, this first occurred when she represented Emily Dickinson in 788: The Carriage. In that comic, Emily is drawn exactly as the standard version of Hairbun, and she is labeled as such. She has been used twice to represent Marie Curie in 896: Marie Curie, as a zombie, and in the Thing Explainer book, in the explanation for The pieces everything is made of (e.g., the periodic table).
Differences from other characters[edit]
There are some characters with hair buns that are not Hairbun. Since she is a grown woman, she should not be confused with Jill or any other small girls, even if they have hair buns, like in the fifth panel of 1584: Moments of Inspiration.
In 572: Together, a woman looking like Hairbun is obviously Megan who has turned old during the comic, so this comic is not included here. But it could indicate that Randall often uses Hairbun to represent an older woman, as this was also the case in 586: Mission to Culture. Likewise, a character with a hair bun was also featured in 911: Magic School Bus, but she is drawn in color, with a dress, and a much different hair bun style, as she represents the fictional character Ms. Frizzle. She is thus not included as a Hairbun.
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