About

[Visible Confusion] refers to an image from the 2002 film Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones depicting Obi-Wan Kenobi with a confused expression. Online, the image has been used as a reaction image expressing bewilderment, most commonly paired with the titular caption in vein of Descriptive Noise memes.

Origin

On May 16th, 2002, Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones was released in the United States.^[1] In the film, Obi-Wan Kenobi (portrayed by Ewan McGreggor) investigates the mysterious planet of Kamino, where he is told that the inhabitants have been working on a clone army (shown below).

Prior to the adoption of the Obi-Wan variation, other image macros featuring the "[visible confusion]" caption existed, usually with the image's subject looking shocked. For example, KnowYourMeme ^[2] user G.E.C.K.O. shared an image as an example of a Descriptive Noise meme (shown below).

Spread

On April 6th, 2017, Redditor Rampage470 posted a GIF of the scene along with the caption "When you realise you've come to enjoy the prequels and you can't figure out whether it's because you've learned to appreciate their good aspects while taking the bad or if it's just because the memes have given you something to laugh at," which received over 8,900 upvotes^[3] (shown below, left).

On February 3rd, 2018, Redditor Dishonorablejedi posted the image with the caption "When you're just trying to make your first post, but you realize that this subreddit is being overrun with post of muscular men," which received over 22,000 upvotes^[4] (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Template

Search Interest

External References