Above are several photos of Sean Penn at the premiere of "Gangster Squad" in Hollywood last night. Does his head seem a little bit bigger to you? For comparison purposes, below we have included a photo of Sean Penn from five years ago when "Milk" came out in 2008.

Looking back, there's evidence Sean Penn's head literally started inflating and his face began to slide right off his skull some point around early 2009. Around the time Bobby De Niro introduced Penn's Oscar Nomination for Best Actor in 2009. Watching footage of that speech is like watching your middle school gym coach inflating a basketball with a bike pump:

"How did he do it? How for so many years, did Sean Penn get all those jobs playing straight men? Sometimes being a movie star can get in the way of acting, but not for Sean Penn."

A less inflated-looking Penn gave De Niro his own public admission of manly love and actorly respect at the AFI Lifetime Achievement Awards in 2003. Judging by the look on both these men's faces at the time, that speech made them both deeply depressed:

Is Sean Penn's increasing hat size a signal of his massive actor-brain? Proof that he must be some kind of super genius with enormous brain lobes? Because who else could possibly be able to negotiate the freedom of U.S. citizens held hostage in Iran and then go on to pretend to be a member of the Jewish mafia?

Also, what's up with this deep orange color? Has the sun toasted Sean Penn's forehead like a giant marshmallow? A sign of a terrible, 2-pounds-a-day baby carrot habit?

Meanwhile: Ryan Gosling brought his mom out to the "Gangster Squad" premiere. Donna Gosling everybody! She is America's mom for the rest of the week.