smiles for school photo / gets turned into a meme
A Bad Luck Brian post.
Bad Luck Brian is Kyle Craven's school yearbook photo: a smiling teenager in a plaid sweater vest, braces and an awkward haircut. A friend posted it to Reddit in 2012. Kyle dressed up for the photo as a joke, and he has taken the fame in the same spirit. Brian, his alter ego, has not been so lucky. The top line sets up something ordinary or hopeful; the bottom line delivers the worst possible outcome. "Finally gets a date - it's with the dentist." "Wins the lottery - loses the ticket." "Takes a selfie - becomes a meme." The trick is improbability. Real bad luck is boring; Brian's is spectacular, cosmic and always perfectly timed. He smiles through all of it, which only makes things worse. **Why it caught on:** a face that hopeful is just made for everything to go wrong.