Normalized distributions of the fitted position angle of the forward jet in selected fiducial thermal models based on the snapshot scoring with 2017 and 2018 observations, using the best-fit 10% of the images. The PA = 288° ±10° of the milliarcsecond-scale jet (Walker et al. 2018; Cui et al. 2023) is marked by the vertical dashed black line and shaded gray region. Left: Models with a black hole spin axis or a coordinate system axis (case a_* = 0) pointing toward Earth. Prograde cases are shown in the top (a_* >  0) and middle (a_* = 0) panels, and the retrograde case (a_* <  0) is shown in the bottom panel. Right: Models with a black hole spin axis or with a coordinate system axis (case a_* = 0) pointing away from Earth. Prograde cases are shown in the top (a_* >  0) and middle (for a_* = 0 the matter angular momentum is always aligned with the coordinate axis) panels, and the retrograde case (a_* <  0) is shown in the bottom panel. See text in this paper or Fig. 5 in M87^* 2017 V for a description of the geometry of the black hole axis, flow rotational axis, and inclination angle.