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An image depicting Erin Moriarty's Plastic Surgery with a before and after picture from 2024.

Erin Moriarty Plastic Surgery

Updated Jan 30, 2024 at 12:13PM EST by Brandon.

Added Jan 17, 2024 at 05:49PM EST by Zach.

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Related Explainer: Who Is Erin Moriarty And Why Are People Saying She's Had Plastic Surgery? How 'The Boys' Star Went Viral In Memes And Online Discourse

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About

Erin Moriarty Plastic Surgery or Erin Moriarty Cosmetic Surgery refers to a viral series of photos of American actress Erin Moriarty, best known for her role as the character Annie January / Starlight in the TV series The Boys, after she reportedly had plastic surgery and posted the images to her Instagram in mid-January 2024. The selfies garnered considerable media coverage and spread online as people discussed them, also creating memes comparing older images of Moriarty. The criticisms Moriarty received after they were posted also generated discourse with some criticizing the negative reactions expressed online about her appearance.

Origin

On January 14th, 2024, Erin Moriarty posted a series of selfies to her Instagram[1] account (@erinelairmoriarty) with the caption "watch me de-sophisticate before your very eyes." The post received over 194,000 likes and numerous comments in three days (seen below). The images were then deleted from her account sometime between the night of January 17th and the morning of January 18th.



Precursor Discourse

This was notably the second time that Erin Moriarty had gone viral for images of her causing speculation of plastic or cosmetic surgery. On July 26th, 2022, the X account @archivetheboys[2] uploaded two images of Erin Moriarty from her having her hair done, showing what appeared to be a more pronounced jawline and face structure than previous pictures had shown, earning over 17,000 likes while also sparking people to talk about her possibly doing a procedure on her face, speculated to be buccal fat removal (shown below).



Memes about her different facial appearance in 2022 quickly spread online, often being negative depictions of her current face while users expressed a preference for the way she used to look. For example, on November 28th, 2022, Redditor u/Muskelmaus[3] uploaded a Wheels on a Shopping Cart meme using four pictures of Moriarty, with three of them being older photos and one of them having the previously posted picture of her hair appointment from July, implying that her new appearance was worse than her previous one (shown below).


Wheels on a shopping cart be like: B

Spread

One of the highest engagement posts that went viral discussing Erin Moriarty's photos was posted on X / Twitter[10] by user @hippojuicefilm on January 14th, 2024. Their tweet (seen below) garnered over 34 million views, 135,000 likes, 18,000 reposts and 11,000 replies in four days.


Royce Lopez @hippojuicefilm. Follow Women need to stop plastic surgery until we figure out what's wrong. Why would you ruin your face like this? it This is Erin Moriarty from The Boys...she was already very pretty. X E

After the mid-January 2024 selfies of Moriarty started to be spread on social media in the following days, more memes began to circulate revolving around her changed look, often comparing photos of the actress from 2020 to 2024 with a negative stance being against her 2024 appearance.

For example, on January 16th, 2024, Imgur user astronomypictures[4] uploaded a side-by-side comparison of Moriarty with her character's name "Starlight" being used for her former look and "Stoplight" being used to label her current one (shown below). The meme received nearly 3,400 views, 50 upvotes and 60 comments in 24 hours.



The viral discourse also resulted in media coverage from various outlets, such as Cosmic Book News,[5] The Spectator[6] and Fandom Wire,[7] each of which published articles covering Erin Moriarty's Instagram selfies and the online reaction in mid-January 2024.

Some users also defended Moriarty as the photos garnered discussions online.[8] For example, on January 15th, Twitter / X[9] user @DannyDrinksWine posted a tweet about the "huge outcry over Erin Moriarty's plastic surgery," receiving over 135,000 views, 250 likes and 110 replies in three days (shown below).


DepressedBergman @DannyDrinks Wine . Follow I don't understand this huge outcry over Erin Moriarty's plastic surgery. If she likes it, who are we to question her choice? She looks beautiful either way to me. X

Break From Social Media

On January 26th, 2024, Erin Moriarty deleted several of her recent posts on Instagram and updated her story with a long-form paragraph picture describing how much trauma she had felt over the reaction to her posts and that she is stepping away from social media effective immediately. The post, which was spread across two photos, received a lot of compassion from her fans who were upset that the star had received so much negative attention from the internet (shown below).


The only reason I have not deactivated my account is because I will be leaving this here. Otherwise, consider it deactivated. I will not have access to it for an extensive if not permanent break. social media was my ability to connect with fans. My ability to work with but also mostly just share brands that I believe in, on an independent level and otherwise. To share news or updates. But I'm deciding to invest my energy into my work. social media is not something that came naturally to me and that was an investment of energy to connect with you guys. And I am horrified by the reaction, the reductive assumptions, and the aforementioned video that is a primary example of such harassment. It's broken my heart. You've broken my heart. You've lost the privilege of this account. so, you can believe whatever you want. But there's no excuse for these horrific allegations, the verbal abuse that I have had to delete, and genuinely false information that is being used to perpetuate a message that is exhibitionist feminism. You don't have to believe me when I say that these videos are absolutely false. but the way that this has been spoken about, the way that I have been spoken to, I will not accept. I have been in a hole and I've been consumed by this personal situation at hand. You never know what someone is going through, social media is a platform that is not representative of a whole person, and irregardless there is no excuse for the words that have been spoken directly to me or about me. shame on you Megyn Kelly. shame on you, Fox News (vought incarnate). implying that my photo is reflective of women being in a worse place is as false as my conviction in saying that if you resigned, you would be leaving women in a better place. This is something I truly never anticipated writing. We're all subject to levels of bullying throughout our lives but I am horrified, and I felt that I deserved to take a second to address these things. I had no idea what was going on, to be honest, because I've had one of the most challenging weeks of my life. And I specifically thought that as I emerge this period of time - so stressed that I have BARELY been able to eat and sleep. I thought ok, I'm going to emerge this 10 pounds thinner and the verbal abuse/accusations will be flying - usually either drug use or just a flippant "eat a burger" comment. You learn to become teflon and move on. I had NO idea what was going on this time. To receive a message about a disgustingly false, counterproductive to the degree of being ironically misogynistic video of Megyn Kelly commenting on the manner - to learn the widespread nature of this has left me horrified. Megyn used a photo taken "a year ago" according to her, that had in actuality been taken about a decade ago before I was of LEGAL DRINKING AGE (I'm about to turn 30) as an example (maybe do some research that would take 30 seconds). How utterly misinformed, inaccurate, and clickbait seeking people who we follow and consider to be informed is appalling. I got my make up done that day and it involves major contouring and I remember leaving and feeling pretty. And even that day was an immensely stressful day for me. I came running to those girls and I showed up in tears after what had happened that day and I left feeling better simply because I felt like they had reduced my lack of sleep and worked their magic wands. I saw the comments, scathing enough to just turn my comments off. But this is becoming harassment. This is becoming false news.

Various Examples



@doctoryoun Did Erin Moriarty (Starlight) have plastic surgery? #starlight #erinmoriarty #theboys #theboystv #plasticsurgery ♬ The Boys Arrive (Theme from "The Boys") – Cinematic Legacy

@kamistores Erin Moriarty Before And After | #erinmoriarty #starlight #anniejanuary #fortheboys #glowup #glowdown #theboys #theboyssupesup #theboyss3 #amazonprimevideo #actress #plasticsurgery #weigthloss #fyp #trending #viral ♬ Booty (feat. Latto) – Saucy Santana
@luviacure Did Erin Moriarty Have a Plastic Surgery . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . #celebrity #celebrityvideos #beforeandafter #celebritybeforeandafter #erinmoriarty #erinmoriartyedit ♬ When I Ride – Ashley Mehta

@drgarynyc Did Erin Moriarty have plastic surgery? #plasticsurgery #plasticsurgeon #plasticsurgeonnyc #surgeontok #erinmoriarty ♬ original sound – DrGary

Search Interest

External References

[1] Instagram – @erinelairmoriarty

[2] X – archivetheboys

[3] Reddit – Muskelmaus

[4] Imgur – astronomypictures

[5] Cosmic Book News – The Boys Erin Moriarty Apparently Underwent Massive Plastic Surgery

[6] The Spectator – Why is everyone getting bad plastic surgery?

[7] Fandom Wire – Erin Moriarty’s Before and After Pictures

[8] Winter is Coming – Fans come to The Boys star Erin Moriarty's defense after she's accused of plastic surgery

[9] X – DannyDrinksWine

[10] X – hippojuicefilm

[11] Instagram – Erin Moriarty

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Gumshoe
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Gumshoe

It's kind of sad to see. She was genuinely incredibly good looking even before the work was done. I don't think it's fair to be mean to her either though. The only possible way she could have gone and done that would be if she already had some major insecurities or something about how she looked. I just wish this kind of thing could be broadly discouraged in a way that wasn't cruel.

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