A Second Life resident has achieved the seemingly impossible by wearing a man-bun that looks even more ridiculous than one attached to an actual man. Jax Blackthorne, whose appearance suggests he has strong opinions about coffee despite possessing no functioning digestive system, unveiled the hairstyle on Tuesday after spending L$399 and forty minutes deciding which shade of brown best conveyed emotional unavailability. The result has been described by witnesses as “a small bread roll left on top of a nightclub bouncer”.
Friend Mischa explained that while a real-life man-bun could occasionally be excused by circumstance, Jax had no such defence. “Sometimes a man has long hair and needs to get it out of his face because he’s fixing a sink,” she said. “Jax doesn’t have a sink. He has a decorative concrete basin that came with his skybox and has never loaded properly. He’s not keeping his hair out of anything. He went to a shop and specifically asked to look like that.”
Jax has paired the bun with shaved sides, an enormous beard and a tattoo running down his neck in a language he identified as “probably Viking”. His profile describes him as an “old soul”, although friends say most of his wisdom consists of posting photographs of wolves beneath quotes about cutting people off. “I don’t follow trends,” said Jax, wearing the same head, body, beard and trousers as eleven other men at the event. “This is just who I am.” He then admitted to being influenced by Thom Yorke “when he had one”, explaining that the Radiohead singer had demonstrated how a man-bun could communicate artistic depth and a profound unease with the modern world. “Thom Yorke wrote OK Computer,” said Mischa. “Jax has written ‘any females fancy a chat?’ in local three times without getting a reply. You can’t just borrow the bun and assume the rest of Radiohead comes with it.”
Jax nevertheless believes the resemblance is striking, particularly when he uses an animation that makes him look slightly troubled. “He thinks he looks like he’s struggling with the alienation of contemporary existence,” Mischa added. “He looks like he’s waiting for his girlfriend to finish at a hair event.” Sources confirmed that who he is comes in fourteen colours and includes a resizer.
The hairstyle has also raised questions about the choices residents make in a world offering almost unlimited freedom. “You could be anything,” Mischa continued. “A dragon. A being made entirely of light. A mysterious figure whose face is obscured by a swirling galaxy. He’s chosen assistant manager of a craft brewery.”
Jax insists the look appeals to women who appreciate a more mature man, pointing to a recent interaction in which another resident called him “hun” and asked him to move because he was standing on the vendor. He has since added a loose strand of hair across his forehead to give the impression that the style happened naturally, rather than being selected from a folder called HAIR FINAL ACTUAL USE THIS ONE.
Maintaining this carefully cultivated effortlessness requires a separate hairbase, two alpha layers and occasional adjustments to prevent the bun disappearing into his skull during certain dances.
At the time of publication, Jax was standing motionless at an indie club with his arms folded, allowing everyone sufficient time to appreciate how little he cared about his appearance. His real-life counterpart was unavailable for comment, having briefly taken his hair down because it was giving him a headache.