Leaving the house is overrated. Sure, there are like, flowers, and friends, and fun things to do out there, but also you have to wear sunscreen, and spend money to do the fun things, and sometimes you have to talk to strangers when you don’t feel like it. And WORSE, you can’t always wear the exact outlandish amazing makeup you’re in the mood for because of stuff like “professionalism” and “appropriateness;” dreary awful things that plague the outside places. But at home? You are free! Free to wear all the facepaint you please, and it’s all for you, baby: you, your mirror, and any fortunate souls you happen to share a pic with online. Too much? For you? NEVER.
Last week I—like everybody else on my Twitter feed—went to see Mad Max: Fury Road, and this week—like everybody else on my Twitter feed—my aesthetic has skewed strongly Furiosa-ward. However, I am also obsessed with the paint-huffing War Boys’ silver mouths (gross, but, AWESOME LOOKING), so instead of straight-up trying to imitate Charlize, I see myself as more of a fervent fanatical War Girl eager to sacrifice my pathetic life in service of my newly-minted Lady Immortan. Here’s how you, too, can frighten your neighbors when you run outside to practice howling and leaping off of your car to smash stuff!
First, you’ve gotta blacken your waterlines. There’s no getting around it: waterlining/tightlining your eyes kind of sucks, but if you want your eyes to look like coals of fury glaring out of a chasm of eternal darkness, you’ve just gotta suck it up and stick a sharp stick in your eye. I like NYX ‘cause it’s cheap and it doesn’t melt off easy.
Sharpen your liner before you go poking it up in your eye socket and you greatly reduce your risk of scratching yourself with a splintery tip (which hurts). Remember to breathe, and don’t press too hard (if you have to bear down to deposit color, you need a better liner pencil). Try not to look directly at the liner with the pupil of the eye you’re coloring; that’ll make you blink! If you do blink and jab the liner directly into your upper eyelid, no big—you’re about to paint half your head black. You can do this.
Draw that stuff all over the inner rim of your eyelid — top and bottom. Did it? Success? Good! Now mascara. I don’t need to tell you how to do that.
Then, darken your eyesockets+forehead. I used a cheap black eyeshadow I’ve had for longer than I should admit. I used a blush brush to tap it all over my forehead, for the sake of speed, and a smaller eyeshadow brush to pack it in around my eyes. Really shove it into your eyebrows and hairline so you don’t end up with any weird little bare streaks.
Get really close to the mirror so your myopic ass can see what you’re doing.
If you get black shadow all over your face and neck, good! Just makes you look grungier and more badass. Use your finger to smudge the edge of the shadow where it meets your exposed nose and cheeks. Consider applying some white powder to your exposed skin; decide, ‘nah, we’re all much healthier looking under the reign of Furiosa than we were with Joe in charge.’ (What kind of dumb dictator name is “Immortan Joe,” anyway??) Admire yourself in the mirror.
And now you’re ready to get shiny and chromed!