DreamWorks Face

About

DreamWorks Face refers to a phenomenon often seen in posters and promotional material created for animated movies made by DreamWorks in which a character is shown smirking with one eyebrow raised and the other furrowed. The phrase "DreamWorks Face" has been noted online as early as the mid-2000s, with artists and internet users referencing the classic smirk in subsequent years.

Origin

The "DreamWorks Face" refers to a facial expression often seen in the posters and marketing material for children's movies made by DreamWorks Animation studios. A TV Tropes^[1] entry from March 24th, 2011, describes it as the "clever, asymmetrical smirk. The similarly crooked eyebrows. The intense stare-down that comes at you from the promo posters. (seen below).

The earliest known joke about the DreamWorks Face is a webcomic from 2009 in which two stick figures compare Disney and DreamWorks (seen below). The earliest appearance of this webcomic online is a March 30th, 2009, post by Flickr^[2] user Zoot Sutra, who gathered over 380,000 views on the post in 15 years (seen below).

The meme was widely reposted online on sites like Reddit^[3] and DeviantArt^[4] in subsequent months.

Spread

Memes and jokes about the DreamWorks Face continued to spread in the 2010s, with a forum^[5] user posting a meme featuring Hurley from Lost making the DreamWorks Face on June 8th, 2010 (seen below, left). On September 6th, 2013, an MLP^[6] forum user posted a storyboard from Regular Show in which Rigby is shown doing the face (seen below, right).

On May 10th, 2015, Tumblr^[7] user @absolita responded to someone finding out about the Dreamworks Face with an anecdote about the animators at the studio. The user claimed that all the animators hate the face, but that the marketing teams at DreamWorks insist on using it. The post gathered over 150,000 notes in nine years (seen below, left).

On August 10th, 2022, X^[8] user @MationMiss suggested that the new "DreamWorks Face" may be the "awkward smile," gathering over 11,000 likes in two years (seen below, right).

Search Interest

Unavailable.

External References