On Wednesday, Oct. 23, the Saturday Night Live alum, 30, stepped out to attend the sneak preview of The Room at the Intuit Dome in Inglewood, Calif. — and for the first time, fans got a good look at what seems to be a more pared-down look for the comedian.
Posing with rapper Machine Gun Kelly, Davidson can be seen with mostly bare arms — a stark departure from his previous look, which included tons of small tattoos up and down his arms.
He also wore a red FDNY T-shirt that featured the organization’s logo, followed by “Fire Dept. of New York,” presumably in honor of his late dad, Scott Matthew Davidson, an N.Y.C. firefighter who died in the 9/11 attacks in 2001.
Davidson first announced that he was embarking on the long-term journey to remove his tattoos in 2020, when he revealed that he had already begun tattoo removal from his hands during a Q&A for his film, The King of Staten Island, according to film critic Mike McGranaghan, who had been in a panel with the cast.
During a 2021 episode of Late Night with Seth Meyers, the stand-up comedian confirmed his decision, saying at the time that his budding film career prompted him to pursue tattoo removal.
"I honestly never thought that I would get an opportunity to act and I love it a lot," Davidson told host Seth Meyers. "It takes, like, three hours — you have to get there, like, three hours earlier — to cover all your tattoos. For some reason, people in movies, they don't have them that much."
A few months later, the comedian gave an update to PEOPLE about how the removal process was going and said that he hoped to be done with it by age 30.
"I get my next treatment [in] like a month or so. They said by the time I'm 30, they should all be gone. So they got like two more years left of this," he explained.
By January 2023, Davidson was photographed shirtless while hitting the beach with his then-rumored girlfriend Chase Sui Wonders. He had removed even more tattoos by then — including all of the ones he had dedicated to his ex-girlfriend of nine months Kim Kardashian.
The Bodies Bodies Bodies star had a "My girl is a lawyer" tat (in reference to Kardashian passing the baby bar in December 2021) and the initials "KNSCP" (Kardashian and her four children's initials — North, Saint, Chicago and Psalm, whom she shares with her ex-husband Kanye West). He also had the names "Aladdin" and "Jasmine" and an infinity sign, inspired by the pair's 2021 Saturday Night Live sketch in which they kissed for the first time.
This appearance in Inglewood marks one of Davidson's first public appearances in months. In July, Davidson checked into a wellness facility for his mental health, PEOPLE reported. Prior to that stay, he sought treatment to address issues related to PTSD and borderline personality disorder in 2023.