UNLESS you’ve been hiding under a rock, you’ve probably heard about the ‘hot rodent man’ trend.
TikTokers are talking about it, newspaper columnists are writing about it and women are going crazy for men who are the opposite of what we would consider conventionally handsome.
The term refers to a host of lusted-after celebrity men who resemble rodents with their rat-like features such as little pointy faces, beady eyes, and sticky-out ears.
These men are not tall in stature and are slightly on the skinny side.
They’re the sort of guys women wouldn’t necessarily expect to be aroused by and the total antidote to Barbie’s Ken.
But these hot rodent men — yes Kieran Culkin, Josh O’Connor, Mike Faist, Jeremy Allen White, Timothee Chalamet, Adam Driver, Barry Keoghan and Matt Healy, I’m looking at you — are having their moment in the sun and I have to say I’m not surprised.
This tendency for women to go for slightly unconventional men has always been there.
There have always been men who have so much charisma, confidence and talent that they prove to be irresistible, even if they’re not typically good-looking. Anyone who Dustin Hoffman in The Graduate will know what I mean.
He was hardly a hunk — he didn’t look as if he was going to seize you, take you into his cave and have his wicked way with you. But he was really sexy and women went mad for him.
So this trend isn’t new, it’s just been rebranded.
As one TikToker said last week, “It’s hot rodent boyfriend summer, but I signed up for that class a long time ago. The rat boys have always been around and always the hottest.”
I saw Saltburn and while Barry Keoghan doesn’t do it for me, women fancy him like mad. He had so much body confidence and colossal enthusiasm when he did that naked dance.
It’s that swagger and charisma that’s so sexy and clearly his singer girlfriend Sabrina Carter agrees.
Likewise, nobody can make chopping veg look as seductive as Jeremy Allen White in The Bear, and while Willy Wonka was never a sex symbol, Timothee Chalamet made a maroon velvet coat seem appealing in Wonka.
Personally, I’m more of a Wesley Snipes kind of a girl and I don’t like the weaselly look.
That said, I’d never rule out dating someone who looks like that because if they turned out to be attractive, humorous and energetic, then of course I’d consider it.
The idea that to be fanciable, you’ve got to look a certain way isn’t true. It’s totally oppressive and boring.
I know a few attractive, sexy women who have chosen men of diminutive stature who you might say are a bit on the weaselly side, but the moment you start talking to them you totally get it.
The whole perfect, muscly action man look is a bit passé. As we’ve seen from the lukewarm response to this year’s Love Island “hunks”.
I went on a date with a male model years ago, and he was cookie-cutter handsome.
He was 6ft 4in, incredibly slim, very hench and had flawless skin and beautiful eyes.
The whole perfect, muscly action man look is a bit passé
Vanessa
When he asked me out I could hardly believe it.
I was in a lather of excitement but turns out the guy was extraordinarily boring.
So maybe these rodent guys are just way more fun? Maybe they’re better in bed and they’re lovely to have dinner with.
I know lots of young women might feel it’s a case of double standards that they’re expected to look a certain way with the right hair, boobs and dress size, while all these men have women falling at their feet even though they look like rats.
As another TikToker said: “how come they don’t have hot rodent girlfriends?”
But we all know the most attractive thing is to be yourself and that looking a little different is something to be prized.
The “hot rodent man” trend is something worth celebrating as far as I’m concerned, and long may we encourage people to feel good about being different!
