Over the past few decades there have been some major fluctuations with the types of stars in action movies. Looking from where I’m at, Hollywood has had all sorts of actors play action heroes. Some that were in good shape, some that were in not so very good shape at all, and some in between.
These are the guys that inspired kids like me to workout in the first place. Some because they were strong, fought well, and looked awesome. And others because I never wanted to be an out of shape super hero. Now let’s take a look at a few of these super stars that have brought life to our favorite action heroes throughout the years.
First up is an actor who has become nearly as iconic as Batman himself, Adam West. Interestingly enough he was the third actor to portray the character of Batman. For the comic geek uninitiated, a few of Batman’s physical stats and capabilities are as follows. He’s 6’2”, 210 lbs. and he can bench press somewhere in the neighborhood of 600 lbs. According to IMDB.com, Adam West is 6’2” so that’s right on, however as anyone who has seen the old Batman shows, he was not very muscular. I don’t want to bag on Adam West because the shows he was in and his portrayal of Batman were uniquely entertaining. Although very cheesy.
My point is that the action heroes back in his day were not very muscular. They appeared to be average men just wearing costumes. Guys like John Wayne who had characters created for him got away with it. Of course after that phase came the other extreme. I believe it was Arnold who was the chief herald in the chapter of very big and muscular action stars, and Sylvester “Sly” Stallone was right there with him.
Some of the characters portrayed by muscle heads such as these should have had more personality depth as people, and some of the characters portrayed by those actors should have had more beef. To be fair though, Arnold and Sly did get better as time went on. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t mean complain. At least not too much, because both of these phases taught Hollywood a lesson, for the most part.
Today we have excellent actors such as Daniel Craig who plays a buff, ripped, but not overly muscled, James Bond. This year in particular we have two great actors, Chris Evans and Chris Hemsworth who muscled up into being two super heroes that are of Arnold like proportions. These two guys don’t have a big build to begin with, but they pulled it off. They may be a few pounds off, or in the case of Thor a few hundred pounds off, but the “look” was achieved. Are we asking for an actor to wield a weather controlling hammer in real life? (No, but that would be awesome). We really just want him to look like he can.
As time goes on we are seeing more and more action movie stars that look and act like the character, and it’s awesome. For me personally these characters continue to inspire me in my diet and workout goals, and now the actors are creating even more inspiration. Hopefully some of these action heroes and the stars that portray them can provide you with the extra motivation that you sometimes need as well.
