History Main / TechnicallyASmile

* Baraka from ''VideoGame/MortalKombat'' always seems like the cheerful type, but that most likely comes from having MoreTeethThanTheOsmondFamily.

* In ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'', Sansa Stark immediately notices that [[MagnificentBastard Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish]] has this kind of smile when meeting him for the first time.

[[folder:Web Comics]]

* PsychoticSmile

* Due to the shape of their mouths,[[FriendlyPlayfulDolphin dolphins]] have what looks like a "smile" on their faces regardless of their mood. This "smile" makes it very easy to assume that dolphins are nice and gentle. The truth is that they are not.

* [[FriendlyPlayfulDolphin Dolphins]] have what looks like a "smile" on their faces regardless of their mood. This "smile" makes it very easy to assume that dolphins are nice and gentle. The truth is that they are not.

** Faye's [[http://questionablecontent.net./view.php?comic=1215 customer-service smile]] makes the customer recoil in horror and causes her boss to rescind her instruction to "have a smile ready".

* Sans the skeleton from ''VideoGame/{{Undertale}}'' is... well, a skeleton. As such, his face is stuck in a permanent smile. Thankfully, Sans is a silly, fun dude, so the constant grinning is usually genuine. But on those rare occasions that he's being serious (such as [[spoiler:if you kill his brother, or murder every single monster in the Underground]]), then the effect is *really* chilling.

Humans are one of the few creatures to bare their teeth as anything other than a threat; this trope comes into play during those times when a "smile" conveys something more... animalistic. Look for the phrase "didn't reach his/her eyes" to appear.

* In ''WesternAnimation/LiloAndStitch'', 626 (Stitch) bares his teeth in the most humorously creepy way when he says ''"Hi!"'' to Lilo in an attempt to show friendliness and to get her to adopt him. Considering what happens from there, you could say that it worked.

* In ''Disney/LiloAndStitch'', 626 (Stitch) bares his teeth in the most humorously creepy way when he says ''"Hi!"'' to Lilo in an attempt to show friendliness and to get her to adopt him. Considering what happens from there, you could say that it worked.

* In Disney's ''Disney/BeautyAndTheBeast'', Lumiere attempts to coach the Beast in order to help him win Belle over, "Give her a dashing, debonair smile. Come, come, show me the smile." The Beast tries, but the result mostly involves baring a mouthful of very sharp fangs and is not remotely dashing or debonair. Mrs. Potts, who is also trying to coach him, is aware, however of what it looks like, and quickly warns him not to "frighten the poor girl."
* A scene late in ''Disney/TheJungleBook'' has Mowgli running away in disgust after both Bagheera and Baloo tell him it's time to leave the jungle. He eventually finds himself wandering through a bleak wasteland that's dangerously close to Shere Khan's territory. A quartet of vultures who look a lot like Music/TheBeatles (and sound like them, too) befriend Mowgli and try to cheer him up - but Mowgli is so miserable that when one of the vultures says: "Give us a smile," all he can do is halfheartedly curl up one corner of his mouth.

* ''Film//IndianaJonesAndTheLastCrusade'' features one from Elsa, after she "helps" Donovan choose the "right" grail.

* ''Fanfic/BuckyBarnesGetsHisGrooveBackAndOtherInternationalIncidents'': When Steve Rogers has some FBI agents sent to spy on him trussed up and is standing over their kneeling, ziptie-restrained forms totally not waving his gun at them, one of the agents tells Steve he's crazy. Steve responds to this with a smile, "feeling his face stretch back over his teeth".

* Mentioned in ''Literature/DannyTheChampionOfTheWorld''. A "mouth smile" without an "[[WindowsOfTheSoul eye smile]]" is said to look [[UncannyValley disturbingly wrong]]. Therefore, the protagonist's father skips the mouth smile entirely, smiling ''only'' with his eyes.

* Jones of ''Webcomic/GunnerkriggCourt'' [[spoiler:had to learn all emotional responses through observation and mimic, having none of her own.]] She [[http://www.gunnerkrigg.com/?p=1127 mentions to Antimony]] that she knows how to smile in theory, but in practice it's unnerving. The actual result isn't shown, only Annie's reaction.

* A staple of Creator/LarryNiven's ''Literature/KnownSpace'' books. Kzin are predators, born and bred. So when you can see all of their teeth, this is not a ''friendly'' expression. Likewise, humans dealing with Kzin are well-advised to keep their mouths closed when they smile - they may be blunt little monkey-teeth but baring them is still a threat/challenge.
* In ''Literature/ASongOfIceAndFire'', Sansa Stark immediately notices that [[MagnificentBastard Petyr 'Littlefinger' Baelish]] has this kind of smile when meeting him for the first time.

[[folder: Tabletop Games]]

* Sans the skeleton from ''VideoGame/{{Undertale}}'' is... well, a skeleton. As such, his face is stuck in a permanent smile. Thankfully, Sans is a silly, fun dude, so the constant grinning is usually genuine. But on those rare occasions that he's being serious (such as [[spoiler: if you kill his brother, or murder every single monster in the Underground]]), then the effect is *really* chilling.

!!Examples

[[folder: Anime & Manga]]

* Izaya Orihara of ''LightNovel/{{Durarara}}''. It is noted occasionally in the graphic novel that his smile 'doesn't reach his eyes.'

* Joey Wheeler from Anime/YuGiOh sometimes makes a creepy grin which the internet has dubbed "Joey Wheeler's Creepy Chin" whenever:

--->'''Kaiba''': (''Referring to Noah'') Oh my god! What’s wrong with his face? Guys, are you seeing this? What the hell’s wrong with his face?!
--->'''Joey''': (''Has the Joey Chin expression'') I fail to see the problem!
--->'''Kaiba''': What the hell is wrong with everybody’s face?!

[[folder:Comics]]

-->'''Dad''' ''[{{Face Palm}}ing]'': CALVIN!\\
'''Calvin''': [[ExactWords That was a smile! I smiled!]]
* Once when ComicStrip/{{Garfield}} was on a diet and he was grumpy about it, Jon kept urging him to smile. Garfield finally agreed...and grabbed the corners of his mouth and twisted them upward into a "smile", while still flashing his "angry eyes."
** Another had fun with this trope, when Garfield demonstrated two smiles; one with rectangular teeth, and one with triangular, serrated teeth. Naturally, Jon becomes noticeably alarmed at the second one.
** [[https://garfield.com/comic/2003/08/17 This Sunday comic from 2003]] had Jon complimenting Garfield's enormous smile, saying "it's nice to see you in a good mood for a change!" In this case, the "smile" is [[spoiler:a grimace of agony from sitting on a mousetrap.]]
* In an issue of [[ComicBook/GIJoeARealAmericanHeroMarvel G.I. Joe Special Missions]], the Joes go to a rural house to rescue a family from terrorists. They see one guy who always has a [[SlasherSmile crazy-looking grin]] on his face. They initially assume that he is one of the terrorists. Turns out he's one of the hostages, a Marine vet who took shrapnel to the face in Vietnam. This left him with a rictus, a facial spasm that causes a permanent teeth-baring grin.
* If ComicBook/TheJoker's grin isn't depicted (in comics or animation) as being permanently stuck on his face, it's usually depicted as this trope.

[[folder:Films -- Animated]]

-->'''Fantasy:''' "Aw, look, he's smiling!"
-->'''Richard:''' "That's a smile?"

* In the Director's Cut of ''Film/Terminator2JudgmentDay'', John Connor tries to teach the titular killer robot to smile. The results are horrifying enough that John abandons the attempt.
** Done again in ''Film/TerminatorGenisys''. This time Sarah Conner tries teaching him to smile with horrendous results. Majority of his attempts freak-out/disturb any of the witnesses.
*** Later in Genisys, this smile ends up on the T-850/T-800's mugshot, much to the police's confusion.

* The ''Literature/{{Discworld}}'' books have this from time to time, usually with werewolves and vampires, but sometimes with Vetinari, and once even with Vimes.
-->"Vimes' smile was as funny as the one that moves very fast towards drowning sailors. And has a fin on top."
** Rincewind does it at least once too-- in his case, it's a rictus grin of sheer terror.

** The Librarian (a three hundred pound orang-utang) smiles a lot. Or at least, his lips turn up showing lots and lots of big yellow teeth.

--> "[Angleton] ''smiles'', and despite all the horrible sights I've seen today so far, I hope most of all that I never see it again before the day I die."

* ''Literature/XWingSeries'': Wedge Antilles sometimes wears a smile that's pure predator. As he gets older it becomes even more so - in ''Literature/LegacyOfTheForce'' he once flashes a smile at someone "like he was a rancor, and they were made of meat."
** A good deal of the works in Franchise/StarWarsExpandedUniverse, particularly that which took place during her political career, depict some variant of the sentence "Leia grinned, showing teeth," giving the notion that the gesture is not particularly friendly.

* Quite commonplace in the ''Literature/HonorHarrington'' universe, with ExactWords eventually showing up when things get '''really''' nasty. See the quotes page.
** Also fairly common in the Literature/{{Safehold}} series by [[Creator/DavidWeber the same author.]]

--> "When most people smile their lips go side-to-side. This lady's went up-and-down, showing lots of her teeth and gums."

[[folder: Live Action TV]]

* ''Series/BuffyTheVampireSlayer'': Buffy meets her mother's surprise romantic interest Ted, and says she's okay with it with a pasted-on smile - GilliganCut to her whaling on a vampire viciously enough to make Giles cringe.

--> '''Weyoun:''' Our men need to know we are still allies. Smile!
--> ''(Dukat grimaces)''
--> '''Weyoun:''' ''[[DisapprovingLook Dukat...]]''
--> '''Dukat:''' ''(Through clenched teeth)'' I'm ''smiling''...!

[[folder: Professional Wrestling]]

[[folder:Webcomics]]

* ''Webcomic/QuestionableContent''

[[folder: Web Original]]
* [[TheNarrator Cecil]] and [[EvilTwin Kevin]] both describe each others' smiles this way in episodes 19A and 19B of ''Podcast/WelcomeToNightVale''.
[[/folder]]

[[folder: Western Animation]]

[[folder: Real Life]]

** ''Technically'' many canines can "smile" to some degree. What most can't do produce a "friendly" looking gesture with their teeth close together. Canines have little incentive to open their mouth and not open their teeth as well since constant panting is usually necessary for regulating body temperature.
* A "wolf grin" is a wolf's way of showing the observer it does not mean them any (serious) harm and is so named because to a casual observer it does not look anything like a grin. Once one has seen a wolf flash its teeth in a truly threatening manner however, the "wolf grin" becomes a welcome sight. Foxes are also capable of smiling, and in fact look happier when doing so than wolves, since their eyes briefly become slits in a similar manner to a truly happy smiling human. However, a fox smile still happens to make their rather prominent canines rather visible.
* [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bgnG4Ni9Jo Horses]] can be trained to do this, based on a horse's natural response to help them identify a scent. Some humans however can find this a bit disconcerting.

* A "wolf grin" is a wolf's way of showing the observer it does not mean them any(serious) harm and is so named because to a casual observer it does not look anything like a grin. Once one has seen a wolf flash its teeth in a truly threatening manner however, the "wolf grin" becomes a welcome sight. Foxes are also capable of smiling, and in fact look happier when doing so than wolves, since their eyes briefly become slits in a similar manner to a truly happy smiling human. However, a fox smile still happens to make their rather prominent canines rather visible.

* In an issue of [[ComicBook/GIJoeARealAmericanHeroMarvel G.I. Joe Special Missions]], the Joes go to a rural house to rescue a family from terrorists. They see one guy who always has a crazy-looking grin on his face. They initially assume that he is one of the terrorists. Turns out he's one of the hostages. He has a rictus, a facial spasm that causes a permanent teeth-baring grin.

** {{Inverted|Trope}} by the anthropomorphic UpliftedWolf Florence: smiling like a human doesn't come naturally to her species, so she has to take care to do it properly to put people at ease. In particular, she has to remember [[http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff400/fv00354.htm not to show]] her fangs.

** The Guardians are EmpoweredBadassNormal {{Mage Killer}}s implanted with a shard of [[spoiler:the [[GaiasVengeance Evil Earth's core]], who have a habit of smiling simply because it releases endorphins that ease the constant grinding pain of what's been done to them.

* Inverted in ''Webcomic/{{Freefall}}'', where Florence (an anthropomorphic wolf) has to remember ''not'' to show her fangs when she smiles in case she [[http://freefall.purrsia.com/ff400/fv00354.htm scares people off.]]
** Although she has discovered that many arguments can be averted by calmly stating her case and then flashing a big, toothy smile.
** Her smile looks forced ''[[FridgeBrilliance because it]] '''[[FridgeBrilliance is]]'''''. The same as with the ''Werewolf'' example above.
* [[PsychoForHire Mordecai]] of ''Webcomic/{{Lackadaisy}}'' [[http://lackadaisycats.com/exhibit.php?exhibitid=84 shows how it's done.]]

* Hannelore from ''Webcomic/QuestionableContent'' [[http://www.questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1399 cannot]] [[http://www.questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1585 smile.]]
** [[http://questionablecontent.net./view.php?comic=1215 Nor can Faye.]]
** [[http://www.questionablecontent.net/view.php?comic=1535 Marigold too.]] This may be a pattern