Remember when the world thought Ben Affleck got a huge rainbow phoenix tattoo, and he explained it away by claiming that it was a fake for the movie Live By Night?
Of course you don’t!
That happened way back in 2015, and Live By Night tanked so hard over the weekend that you probably weren’t even aware it came out.
But believe it or not, some people did see Affleck’s latest directorial effort over the weekend, and they Ben’s “fake” ink makes no appearance in the film.
We suppose that’s not surprising, as the tatt is never mentioned in the Dennis Lehane novel from which Night is adapted, and it would’ve looked pretty anachronistic in a 1920s period drama.
Sure, some people had full-back tattoos by then, but we imagine they spent most of their time at sea.
So why would Ben lie about going under the needle?
Well, it may have something to do with the fact that every Jennifer in his life roasted him to a crisp over the cheese-ball back tatt.
The ink was first photographed shortly after news of Ben’s divorce from Jennifer Garner went public, and when sources stated that the Ed Hardy-esque body art was supposed to symbolize Ben rising from the ashes of his failed marriage, Garner made t clear she wasn’t having that at all:
“You know what we would say in my hometown about that? ‘Bless his heart.’ A phoenix rising from the ashes. Am I the ashes in this scenario?” Garner told Vanity Fair last year.
“I take umbrage. I refuse to be the ashes.”
When Ben’s ex Jennifer Lopez also mocked the tattoo, clearly the Oscar-winner felt it was time to go into damage control mode:
Affleck told Extra that the ink was “fake for a movie” and then executed a quick change of topic:
“I actually do have a number of tattoos, but I try to have them in places where you don’t have to do a lot of cover up,” Ben went on.
“They get sort of addictive, tattoos, after awhile.”
Smooooooth, Batman.
Unfortunately, he didn’t follow through on that one by writing a scene into the script where his character becomes the first person in history to use Greek mythological imagery to piss off his parents.
We’d say he could squeeze it into his next DC flick, but making Bruce Wayne emo might cause Affleck to get stoned to death by fanboys.