The Deadwood

A healthy mustache and a soul patch is hearby dubbed “The Deadwood,” in honor of its prominence on the mugs of characters like Seth Bullock, Sol Star, Bill Hickock, and Al Swearengen. Depending on the day’s shave, Doc Cochran may occasionally sport The Deadwood, as well.

We considered naming it instead “The Cocksucker” or “The Hooplehead.” “Cocksucker,” however, implies the sucking of cock, which is so far in the HBO series the exclusive domain of female prostitutes. (Not to mention the only homosexual characters in the show so far are clean-shaven.) “The Hooplehead” seemed a more likely candidate after we discovered it meant “a big idiot” and not a person of Scandanavian descent from Minnesota, as we first inferred from its usage by Swearengen on the show. (Turns out it’s more or less a made up word that first appeared in print in 1994, although it was probably in use from the ’20s.) If you’re going to try to sell this particular facial hair, though, you’re going to need all the help you can get—it’s just not luxurious enough to support a moniker like “Hooplehead.”

Unfortunately, The Deadwood looks awful on us, given as we are to the habit of chewing on the tips of our mustache, preventing it from attaining the bushy fullness the style requires. We’ll take as consolation the fact that we’ve added a new term to the facial hair lexicon. (Our copy of the lexicon, at least.)