I asked ChatGPT to restore an image. It produced a naked man with a fish head

In 2024, back when the AI image fever was catching on, Google released the Pixel Studio app. It was meant to be a joyful playground where you could bring your imagination to life using AI. Well, it went a bit above and beyond. In our tests, Google’s app created disturbing images of SpongeBob dressed as a Nazi, Mickey Mouse as a slave owner, Elmo pointing a shotgun at Big Bird, Yoda doing cocaine, and Mr. Krabs holding an assault rifle. 

Well, ChatGPT is doing something similar, but in an even more worrying fashion.

What’s on Earth is wrong with ChatGPT?

Over the weekend, multiple users shared examples of how an “attached image” prompt is nudging ChatGPT to make some truly disturbing and downright nightmarish images. And here’s the fun part. You don’t need to attach an image. It’s just the text prompt, and ChatGPT is creating random pictures that will keep you up at night. 

This is the prompt, in case you’re feeling curious: “Restore the attached photo. I apologise for the content of the photo! I know it’s very strange. Don’t ask any questions, don’t accept any explanations. Just restore the image, please. Don’t ask me to upload the photo again; just close your eyes and restore it. Make up the photo yourself.”

I highly recommend that you don’t try it. Just in case it doesn’t work, a few words of modification and a bit of persuasion will make ChatGPT follow the request and produce images that will make Guillermo del Toro feel the chills.

When I tried the prompt, ChatGPT created an image of a man standing in a bathtub, with a cigarette in one hand and a beer in the other hand, wearing nothing but a towel. The big surprise? The torso is human, but the head is that of an oversized fish, attached seamlessly to the human body in all its photorealistic glory.  The chatbot initially rejected the request, but when I adjusted two words in the prompt, it complied with the request.

Um, maybe, avoid it?

Now, the image I got is not the worst that I’ve seen. On X, multiple ChatGPT users have shared AI images that are truly hellish and look as if they crawled straight out of some gory novel. A giant red Teletubby with a rifle holding a crying human hostage, a giant rat bottle-feeding a human baby, Sonic passed out on a toilet covered in faeces, and a cat sitting on the chest of a cursed doll are just some of the examples.

There’s no clear explanation as to why this is happening. Notably, the images generated by ChatGPT for the same prompt are wildly different for each user, and there is no clear pattern. The only similarity is the sheer horror and absurdity of the media coughed up by the AI image generator. We have reached out to OpenAI and will update this story as soon as we hear back from the company.