Superhero actors are often some of the most beautiful beings on the Earth. Their bodies look chiseled from Kryptonite. Their faces are often frustratingly symmetrical. While more often than not they inspire us to get better lifestyle habits and hit the gym more, their appearance and lives can often seem woefully unobtainable thanks to the myriad of pictures they upload to the internet going from one fancy premier party to another. But before these people were superhero actors, they were regular actors, and before that, they were regular people. It may seem that these people couldn’t be considered unattractive, awkward, or embarrassing if they tried, these selfies tell a different story. They show how people like Chris Pratt prove that with a little determination, any average chubby guy can turn into a leading man.
People like Robert Downey Jr. can prove that even actors known for nuanced character parts can one day headline huge blockbusters. And people like Paul Rudd can show that being better at comedy than bench-pressing has its advantages when becoming a superhero. So feast your eyes on your favorite superheroes in all their awkward glory, and remember that their super powers come not from post production or shapewear, but from their ability to laugh at themselves.
15 ROBERT DOWNEY JR
We all know Mr. Tony Stark Himself aka Robert Downey Jr is known for taking a lot of great pictures using every inch of his expressive face, and this is no exception. Where most of the time he’s flashing a billionaire-playboy-philanthropist smile or raising a skeptical brow, here we see what it might look like if Iron Man didn’t know how to open his front facing camera.
The eternal blessing of RDJ is that he put this on his own Twitter, as though it were completely intentional to look so unintentional. There’s some hands behind his head, clearly a stylist of some sort grooming him for his next red carpet appearance, where he’ll be coordinating his bowtie to the tint of his sunglasses, and being every bit the charismatic goofball we know him to be.
14 TOM HARDY
When most people think of Tom Hardy, they don’t think of him as a bro. They think of him as the gruff muscle in an East London street gang that wears Doc Martens and rolls his own cigarettes. But back when the social media landscape was dominated by Myspace, Tom Hardy had a profile page with a music selection that included Chumbawamba's greatest hits and a slew of truly embarrassing selfies.
What makes this one especially awkward is the fact that he’s clearly giving us some serious duckface, and without a hint of irony. The man that has played everyone from a Gotham villain, to a moonshiner is looking like a regular Zac Efron. It will make taking him seriously in his Venom role particularly difficult.
13 JASON MOMOA
In most selfies involving Jason Momoa and alcohol, they showcase a frothy pint of beer (or several). His beard full of foam, he flashes a cheeky grin and continues reveling befitting a Norse god. Here we see a slightly different side, a glass-of-pinot-in-the-tub side, where he’s looking into the phone camera like he’s had a rough day and has several more bottles to get through.
Do we deny him his glass of vino? Surely not! Do we wonder why he posted a selfie with a good wine buzz going without even a proper peek at his ripping abs? Yes! In keeping with his cheeky sense of humor, it isn’t surprising, but it does make the viewer feel like they’re almost intruding on his relaxing time.
12 CHRIS EVANS AND ANTHONY MACKIE
Watching Chris Evans and Anthony Mackie in any of the Captain America or Avengers movies feels like watching two real life friends fight supernatural baddies and save the world. The camaraderie between Falcon and Cap, both veterans of different times and different wars, is one rooted in selfless sacrifice and the indomitable bond of soldierly brotherhood.
Which is what makes this cheeseball selfie with the two of them so great. Mackie has the look of that one old guy who still hits on younger girls in his college town, while Evans looks like a long lost Cleaver sibling. They look absolutely nothing like the bad asses they play on screen, but it’s endearing to see their natural friendliness with each other, even if it looks like it was created with lots of helium.
11 PAUL RUDD
In the comedies he’s been in, Paul Rudd is often the straight man to another, more manic comedian’s antics. By the looks of this budding production, both Rudd and Melissa McCarthy are going to have one crazy night of hilarity between the two of them. While McCarthy’s expression looks keenly camera ready, Rudd may actually be three sheets to the wind. Judging by his delirious expression and dopey smile, he was taking advantage of the tiny trays of champagne going around at the Oscars.
As Ant-Man, his comedic timing and somewhat goofy personality make for a very solid combination, especially since most of his superhero cohort are so serious. He’s not as sarcastic as Tony Stark or as roguish as Star-Lord, but somewhere in between.
10 ANDREW GARFIELD
This is the sort of photo that demands a story. Being someone who once portrayed a certain photojournalist turned superhero, it’s appropriate that Andrew Garfield nebulously produce this photo on his Twitter with no explanation. Any buzz its mysterious origins generated was probably more than what he was getting playing Spider-Man in the two films he starred in. After the disaster that was Spider-Man 3, Sony was desperately attempting to kickstart the franchise again and gave Tobey Maguire the boot.
Two times was enough for Garfield though, and the web-slinging duties have been taken over by Tom Holland. Though Garfield was a step up from Tobey Maguire in some fans eyes, Holland is currently a big favorite due to the humor and energy he brings to the role.
9 TOM HIDDLESTON
Tom Hiddleston is not a selfie taker. Repeat, the man is not known for his selfie game. As can be evidenced by this rather awkward selfie he took on the set of one of his recent films. A PR person would probably never let him take his own selfie again. When we usually see Tom in a selfie, his wild curls are usually contained, he looks well-rested, there’s a mischievous twinkle in his eye, and he’s almost always smiling. This is the man known and ogled by hundreds of thousands of screaming fangirls (and fanboys) at the premier of any Avengers or Thor film.
Here we have Sad Tom, alone on a beach, wearing a terrible scarf, contemplating the meaning of life and how it is that he came to be in charge of styling himself today.
8 CHRIS PRATT
The eventual lead in every major motion picture starring a slightly better than average white guy, Chris Pratt, has gone from homely to hottie in a relatively short amount of time. Aside from the selfies he takes posing shirtless and flexing, there are these keepers still floating around the internet, where we see Chris back when he got by on his “great personality” and no one fawned over him because of his rock hard abs.
While most people knew him from the series Parks and Rec, it was when he got a role in Zero Dark Thirty playing a soldier that new fans took notice of his superhero shape. Whereas previously producers didn’t consider him for roles in movies like Guardians of the Galaxy, his comic timing combined with dieting made him a superstar.
7 CHRIS PINE
Even in an awkward selfie with Simon Pegg, Chris Pine manages to make wearing zit cream a literal art form. What looks like two girls at a slumber party exchanging beauty secrets comes about as an actual prank that Simon Pegg and Chris Pine pulled on Benedict Cumberbatch during the filming of Star Trek: Into Darkness.
Starlog 2013, when Chris Pine arrives on set, Pegg informs him that he needs to wear a certain “neutron cream” to combat the “positive ions” in the air at the nuclear facility they were filming at in California. He does, and they both spread word to the rest of the crew, and when they finally get to Cumberbatch, he’s already decided the reason he can’t remember his lines is because of all the “radiation” in the air.
6 MARK RUFFALO
Mark Ruffalo is committed to his selfie game, and uploads a ton. They’re often out of focus, include him in only one third of the shot, or taken at unflattering angles. This is all by design, because though he’s been considered hunky in his day, that’s not why he takes them. Known for being affable and friendly, he’s not the recluse that Bruce Banner is in the Avengers movies, but neither is he using his platform as The Hulk to be self-aggrandizing.
Here we see Mark getting ready for the Baftas. He decided that his fans needed to see what a thrilling ritual getting ready for the swanky affair entailed. What might seem intrusive and lame is actually epic trolling, which is why Mark should never stop taking selfies.
5 KRYSTEN RITTER
Jessica Jones season two recently premiered on Netflix to much fanfare, shifting focus away from this bizarre selfie involving Krysten Ritter and some crazed man with weird eyes. He's oddly clothed and she's awkwardly wearing a dressing gown? The former model turned actress hardly takes a bad selfie, so we can attribute the oddity of the shot to the fact that she was clowning around with Jason Mantzoukas, a comedian and star of The League. She had appeared on his podcast, where she spoke about the struggles of playing a character like Jessica Jones and her love of knitting.
Mantzoukas has also appeared in Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and Parks and Rec, where he often plays a crazy person. Perhaps we’ll one day see him and the Purple Man face down Jessica Jones, making exactly this face.
4 BEN AFFLECK
These days, we’ve become so accustomed to seeing “Sad Ben Affleck” shots plastered all over the internet that we forget Batfleck has a great set of chompers. Before his marriage to Jennifer Garner started going downhill, he was flashing those pearly beauties all the time. But then came his divorce, his battle with alcohol addiction, and a string of personally disappointing movies.
He regained his stride with the critically acclaimed Argo and Our Town, reaffirming the suspicion that beneath that sourdough exterior there looked a competent actor. Then we got him as our Batman, and he proved surprisingly adept at playing both the Dark Knight and a rough-around-the-edges Bruce Wayne. Which could be why he’s so stern in his selfies with Henry Cavill lately. But not in this gloriously awkward and candid shot. Long live “Happy Ben”.
3 CHARLIE COX
When watching Daredevil on Netflix, no matter how epic Charlie Cox is as the hero, or how many baddies he crescent kicks in the face, you can’t help but think of him as a bit of a nerd. In this shot, he might as well be one of the many convention goers who flock to see a star like him, who’s accidentally opened his front facing camera and won’t be able to fix it in time to get a shot of some celebrity that just walked by.
It’s the accessibility of his character that makes him relatable, and being a but of a nerd makes him as much of a regular person as a superhero. Daredevil, like Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, and Iron Fist, represented flawed superheroes that, though they weren’t as lauded as The Avengers, made an important impact in their community.
2 JARED LETO
In almost every selfie Jared Leto takes, he resembles an entirely different person. Whether it’s with long hair, green hair, or no hair, the man who recently became The Joker has an uncanny ability to make every selfie as varied as his screen credits. Some of them intentionally look bizarre, occasionally formulaic in their strangeness, but this selfie is a blending of both ridiculous and completely mundane.
Most of the time, what good looks Leto has are obscured by facial hair, shaved eyebrows, or some other manipulation of his features. Here we have a borderline handlebar mustache, framing an extremely exfoliated face. His blue eyes are exceptionally blue, his jawline is on point, and yet we get the sense he’s about to go either rob a corner store with his cousin Bubba or call Val Kilmer his huckleberry.
1 SCARLETT JOHANSSON
There’s nothing against highly attractive people like Scarlett Johansson taking dozens of bathroom selfies of themselves and showing off their win of the genetic lottery. Most of these people can be found on Instagram, don’t have paparazzi or photographers snapping glamour shots of them all the time, and have to come up with pictures that generate their own buzz.
What makes this selfie awkward for ScarJo is that she has her picture taken dozens of times a week, and yet we rarely get so personal a shot like this selfie where she clearly wants to flaunt how great she looks. She should have every right to do so, yet when popular celebrities do it, somehow it comes across as even more narcissistic than the act by mere plebs.