Amid its traditionally chaotic offering of exploding toilets, bodily harm and dangerous animal encounters, Jackass Forever impressed audiences with a surprising takeaway regarding star Johnny Knoxville.Over a decade after the release of Jackass 3D, fans online felt obliged to comment on how well the MTV series' 50-year-old star had aged, despite the torment Knoxville had subjected his body to at the behest of Jackass throughout the years. Twitter sounded off in collective approval as the taser-wielding Knoxville led friends, both new and old, through a deluge of maddening pranks and stunts in Jackass' latest offering.
While Knoxville’s hair oscillated between gray and dark brown throughout Jackass Forever, it was the salt-and-pepper look that truly evoked Twitter's latest thirty tizzy. Despite Jackass Forever's stable of stunts including snakes, bears, scorpions, vultures, bulls, pigs and spiders -- prompting PETA's subsequent investigation into the production -- Knoxville's gray-haired aesthetic has skyrocketed the term "silver fox" into a discussion about the film more so than any of the previously mentioned stunts.
Positioned as one of television and cinema's latest nostalgia-fueled offerings, lifelong fans of Jackass have felt the need to defend Knoxville’s seemingly new position as a sex symbol online. Figures such as Barstool's Kayce Smith and actress Mara Wilson have taken to Twitter to assert that Knoxville has always been a prankster heartthrob. Wilson even joked that Obsessive Compulsive Disorder squandered her budding crush on the Jackass star because she was afraid that "seeing him covered in shit and animal jizz again and again would kill [the attraction]."
As Knoxville's far from the only returning star in Jackass Forever, many fans have argued that Steve-O should share in some of the lustful admiration audiences have been dolling out online. In the film, Steve-O takes pride in the fact that he has aged well, particularly considering the difficult period of his life that coincided with the early days of Jackass. Steve-O is not the only one who shares that opinion. Despite the outpouring of attention directed toward Knoxville, a faction of Jackass Forever viewers have been showering Steve-O with similar praise.
Collective internet thirst aside, another aspect of Knoxville's Jackass Forever appearance has become meme-able on Twitter of late. The boisterous proclamation that ends the film's sticky cold open -- "I'm Johnny Knoxville, welcome to Jackass!" -- has started to take off as a meme-format on Twitter in wake of the film's release.
Directed by Jeff Tremaine, Jackass Forever is currently playing exclusively in theaters.
KEEP READING:Â Johnny Knoxville Explains Why He Turned Down an SNL Job Offer
Source: Twitter