Jarhead Stare

About

Jarhead Stare is an exploitable video clip of Swofford from the movie Jarhead, played by Jake Gyllenhaal, staring forward for an extended period, breaking the stare to briefly dart his eyes to the right, as the word "Jarhead" is displayed underneath of him. The scene went viral on TikTok in December 2023 as an image macro format with attached captions, often about staring awkwardly or nervously at something. The memes are often set to the song "Loving Machine" by TV Girl and are similar to other staring memes like thousand-yard stare.

Origin

The 2005 movie Jarhead begins with a scene where the protagonist, Anthony Swofford, is standing in line listening to his drill sergeant. In the scene, Swofford looks forward and stands still while listening, only breaking the stare to briefly look to the right. The scene was uploaded to YouTube^[1] on February 28th, 2023 by Movieclips, garnering over 220,000 views in 10 months (shown below).

On December 5th, 2023, TikToker^[2] @ryan2gosling posted a meme consisting of the scene with the overlayed caption, "When my sister is telling the funniest joke I've ever heard but it's my sister (ain't no shit to smile about)," garnering over 1.3 million views in a week (shown below).

Spread

The meme spread across TikTok over the following days, often under the same original sound, along with a version that mirrors the clip to make it appear as if two people briefly dart their eyes toward one another. For example, on December 8th, 2023, TikToker^[3] @kevlovesports posted a version of the meme that gained over 1.3 million views in four days (shown below, left). On December 9th, TikToker^[4] @pphams posted a version of the meme that gained over 1.7 million views in three days (shown below, right).

On December 10th, TikToker^[5] @22.sonson posted a version of the meme that gained over 1.4 million views in two days (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

Unavailable

External References