The Sad Affleck Memes Explained: Why Ben Affleck Always Looks So Unhappy
The Internet can be a funny place. This has especially become the case with the rise of memes over the last couple of decades, with anything from real-life news footage to promotional photos to awkward family pictures being fodder. Celebrities are not immune to this phenomenon and often find themselves suitable candidates for memehood as well.
Take Ben Affleck. Anyone who spends even a moderate amount of time online will recall the shot of the "Good Will Hunting" actor smoking while looking like he's having the worst day ever — after all, it was the impetus for the Ben Affleck Smoking and Sad Affleck memes. But Affleck has explained that he often looks unhappy despite his inner mood not being quite so dour.
"I have a very unhappy-looking resting face," he admitted on "Jimmy Kimmel Live!" in 2023. "That's how God made me. You don't have to punish me for it." Still, the actor remains lighthearted about it, joking, "I've been the subject of an occasional meme."
Affleck thinks the meme is funny but has one problem with it
While not everyone takes to being the butt of a joke, Ben Affleck admitted that he finds it amusing. "I got to a place where [the public perception] was so different from who I am that I just stopped reading and stopped caring," the actor explained to the Los Angeles Times in 2022. "Even the 'Sad Affleck' meme — that was funny to me. I mean, there's nobody who hasn't felt that way at a junket."
The actor-director is just worried about his three kids seeing them. "I think, 'Oh, are they going to think their dad is fundamentally sad or they have to worry about me?' That's really tough," he explained. Considering Affleck has had a very public battle with alcoholism (which is the tragic reason he dropped out of "The Batman"), it's easy to see why he feels this way. Still, both he and his wife, Jennifer Lopez, maintain that he's doing fine despite occasionally looking like he'd rather be anywhere but where the cameras happen to catch him.
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