The 25 Most Burned In My Brain Images of 2023

Paltrow! DeBose! Santos! See who made this year’s list.

Back back back again! The fourth-annual 25 Most Burned in My Brain Images List. What qualifies as a MBIMB image (LOL at that attempted acronym) is hard to define exactly. Some images are simply immediate no-brainers (George Santos’s “vintage” paparazzi shot). Others are obvious, but require exacting. Take the Gwyneth ski trial as a great example. The inclusion was a no-brainer, but which image? While the trial was quote city (“Well, I lost half a day of skiing,” “he skied into my effing back,” “I wish you well,” and just about everything out of attorney Kristin VanOrman’s mouth), a singular image distilling the cultural resonance was harder to pinpoint. And others are great and worthy contenders but just miss the bar of iconography (Harry splooging on Charlotte’s chest in And Just Like That…). 

When I think of burned in the brain images through the years, some immediates come to mind: Christine Baranski getting her life at the Mamma Mia wrap party, Nicole Kidman freed from her divorce from Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman smoking that cigarette and Nicole Kidman getting hit by that bike, Jamie Lee Curtis going nuclear and Kirsten Dunst eating that salad. There’s eighty-six hundred others, but those are some honest to goodness seared-in-my-hippocampus images.

This annual MBIMB (the acronym is growing on me, TBH) image list began in earnest in 2020 and has by now become tradition. 

2022: https://www.instagram.com/p/CmPe18au5ro/

2021: https://www.instagram.com/p/CXeMhbtOSPF/

2020: https://www.instagram.com/p/CJMBquiBR3P/

It’s meant to visualize the year in popular culture, both bizarre (Britney dancing with the knives) and canonical (Angie K’s sunglasses). So without any further ado, here’s this year’s list as well as some explanation as to why each image made the cut, and a peek at the nine images that were cut for space. Hope you enjoy!