Be A Lot Cooler If You Did

About

"Be A Lot Cooler If You Did" is a memorable quote spoken by Matthew McConaughey from the 1993 movie Dazed and Confused. The movie, a coming-of-age cult classic, received critical acclaim in spite of low box office numbers. Since the film's release, the quote itself has survived as something to reference in real-life conversation, and online as a reaction image.

Origin

The quote is said by Matthew McConaughey's character, David Woodson, while driving around in a car with main characters Pink (Jason London) and Mitch (Wiley Wiggins) in the movie Dazed and Confused, which premiered on September 24th, 1993. The song playing on the radio is "Low Rider" by War, a song prominently used in other stoner settings. In this scene, McConaughey's character asks Mitch if he has a joint on him, and when told no, he says the quote, "Be a lot cooler if you did." Shortly after this exchange is when McConaughey says his better-known catchphrase "Alright, alright, alright," which is viewable in the same video^[1] uploaded to YouTube on December 19th, 2020, by Fresh Potatoes 111 (shown below).

Something commonly found in reaction images that use quotes or catchphrases, the still used in the meme is not the same as when the character says the line. McConaughey's character says the line while he's driving, yet the reaction image uses a still from a different part in the movie where the camera is more focused and directed onto him, accentuating his character and making for a better reaction image. The first archived use of the meme was on Facebook^[2] by the account Anytime Fitness- Fairmont,^[2] who posted the meme as a reply to Lou Ferrigno talking about the movie on June 10th, 2014 (shown below).

Spread

The meme persisted throughout the following years and has spread to places such as Reddit, where Redditor^[3] Dollon_da_God had posted an example of the meme that talks about global warming, gaining 16,600 upvotes in two years (shown below).

On October 22nd, 2020, Redditor god_of_loli posted another example to the /r/memes^[4] subreddit using the scene, receiving over 11,400 upvotes and 98 comments in six months (seen below).

Various Examples

Template

Search Interest

External References