About

Michael B. Jordan Smiling is a reaction image meme that gained traction on Twitter / X in early May 2025. The photo shows Hollywood actor Michael B. Jordan giving an earnest, closed-lip smile while dressed in a dark red or maroon V-neck T-shirt. The image comes from a Variety Studio event at the May 2013 Cannes Film Festival, which Jordan attended to promote his film Fruitvale Station, directed by Ryan Coogler. The meme is similar to previous trends that use celebrity headshots or studio photos as image macros, including the Kevin James Shrugging meme and the Kevin Hart reaction memes trend.

Origin

On May 18th, 2013, Michael B. Jordan visited the Variety Studio at Chivas House at the 66th Annual Cannes Film Festival in Cannes, France, with his co-star Melanie Diaz and director Ryan Coogler.^[1] He was photographed against a white background and dressed in a dark red V-neck T-shirt by Michael Buckner.

An alternate version of the above image began making the rounds online after June 2023, showing a smiling Michael B. Jordan dressed in the same shirt. The earliest accessible post featuring the image is a June 28th, 2023, tweet by Twitter / X^[2] user @Trigger_D_Press.

Another early post featuring the image is a Reddit^[3] comment from Redditor /u/HighFatherEx to the /r/Lookismcomic subreddit from July 4th, 2023.

On January 1st, 2024, Twitter^[4] user @bloutgoggles posted a tweet featuring a slightly blurry or moldy image of Michael B. Jordan wearing a maroon V-neck shirt and smiling into the camera, writing, "I haven't took a shower since last year😂🤦‍♂️," and gathering over 200 likes in a year.

Spread

The meme resurfaced in the spring of 2025, with X^[5] user @MrDeeko27 reposting the image of Michael B. Jordan smiling on May 5th alongside a caption that read, "oh this? it’s a irish beer," referencing a line from Jordan's 2025 film Sinners. The meme received over 685,000 views and 27,000 likes in three days.

Also on May 5th, 2025, X^[6] user @mightberichie tweeted the photo of Jordan, writing, "wifiskeleton song got popular on tiktok and the nigga immediately died," in reference to the rumor that rapper WifiSkeleton died as the parody version of his song, If You See Me Out In Quahog, garnered virality online. The post gathered over 10,000 likes in three days.

On May 6th, X^[7] user @upblissed tweeted the image of Michael B. Jordan to react to a tweet asking if you can "cheat on Lucia," one of the main characters of the new Grand Theft Auto 6 game. The tweet read, "cheating on a latina that just got outta prison with access to rocket launchers?" receiving over 4.3 million views and 144,000 likes in two days.

On May 7th, 2025, X^[8] user @awshuqs tweeted a version of the meme with an Impact font caption that read, "Hey, soul sister, ain't that Mr. Mister on the radio, stereo," gathering over 90,000 likes in a day.

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