My Honest Reaction

About

My Honest Reaction is a catchphrase and an offshoot of the My Reaction to That Information meme, which similarly takes the form of reaction images and videos showing stoic men or animals with the caption "My Honest Reaction." Additionally, the phrase spawned a trend on TikTok in which the caption was set to montages of stoic celebrities and animals set to the song "Luxury" by Azealia Banks.

Origin

"My Honest Reaction" memes began appearing shortly after the advent of "My Reaction to That Information" memes in April 2022. One of the earliest known edits was posted on May 1st, 2022, one month after "My Reaction to That Information" memes began, and was posted by YouTuber Hiroshi.^[1] It features 3D Saul Goodman and gained over 38,000 views in 10 months (shown below).

Spread

My Honest Reaction edits continued appearing over the following several months, often featuring stoic or emotionless characters from pop culture. For example, on July 16th, 2022, YouTuber TheLivingM3m3 made a Source Filmmaker edit, gaining over 19,000 views in seven months (shown below, top). On September 28th, 2022, Instagram user @largetrap then posted a variation featuring the David Martinez Stare, gaining over 53,000 likes in five months (shown below, bottom).

The trend later spread to TikTok in early 2023. On January 30th, 2023, TikToker l0ki.ae posted a compilation of actor Robert Pattinson set to the song "Luxury" by Azealia Banks as a "My Honest Reaction" video, gaining over 171,000 likes in one month (shown below, left). On February 3rd, TikToker @billy.mcg made a similar edit using Ryan Gosling, gaining over 1.2 million likes in one month (shown below, right).

On February 23rd, 2023, Lessons In Meme Culture made a video about the trend, gaining over 144,000 views in five days (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References