The Top 10 Action Heroes of the 80s and 90s

There may be some raised eyebrows that I have included Patrick Swayze on my top 10 action heroes of the 80s and 90s list, but hear me out. Yes, he is probably best known for Ghost and Dirty Dancing, but Patrick Swayze is far more than just the handsome guy that ladies swoon for.

He is also a legit badass and his role as Dalton in the epic film Road House is more than enough for him to punch his way onto this list. Yet, as well as Road House, Patrick Swayze also starred in some other amazing action movies! The same year as Road House he did Next of Kin which is underrated. Plus he also made movies such as Red Dawn and Steel Dawn. Plus his role as the villain in 1991’s Point Break was fantastic. While he may not have as many action movies to his name as the other guys on this list, he is just as badass!  

Also Read: Demi Moore’s Ten Best Movies

Steven Seagal was one of the action heroes that to me and many others had a bit of mystique about him. I do not remember exactly how I heard it, but I heard that he was a legit tough guy. He may not have been as flashy as Van Damme, but he certainly had a presence about him.

His late 80s and early 90s catalog of Above the Law, Hard to Kill, Marked for Death, and Out for Justice are all movies that are pretty badass. They may be full of 80s and early 90s cheese, but that is what makes them so charming. I will say that 1992’s Under Siege is a straight-up fantastic action movie and one that I feel holds up remarkably well to this day. Of course, the less said about the likes of Under Siege 2 the better, but he did have a few solid action movies in the mid 90s, for example, The Glimmer Man was a lot of fun.

We had to have Chuck Norris on this top 10 action heroes of the 80s and 90s list, but I am not just putting him on here because he became a meme for how tough he was in the mid-00s! Chuck Norris is a legit badass and real-life multiple world karate champion.

I loved the Delta Force movies as a kid. The Mission in Action movies are also really fun. When it comes to a Chuck Norris movie, you pretty much know exactly what you are going to get and most of his 80s stuff, especially those themed around war, have a certain style that fans of his just love!

I do want to specifically mention a movie called Hellbound which was released in 1994. This is still an action movie, but it has a bit of a supernatural/sci-fi twist and is one of his more underrated movies. Also, we cannot talk about Chuck Norris without mentioning his role as Walker, Texas Ranger. Granted that was a TV series and not a movie, but I am pretty sure Chuck would show up and kick my butt if I did not mention it.

Kurt Russell may be another one of those actors that you at first don’t tend to think of as an action hero. The reason for that is he is an actor who can pretty much do it all! But truthfully, his action movie credits are some of the best around!

1981’s Escape From New York gave us Snake, and while the sequel was not as good, 1996’s Escape From LA was still a fun time! While The Thing is classed as a horror, it has more than enough “action” to get it a mention here. Also, Big Trouble in Little China is one of the greatest action movies of the 80s and it’s a real shame Kurt Russell never played Jack Burton again. Hopefully, the rumors about it happening will turn out to be true! He and Stallone were great as Tango & Cash in 1989 and he had a hell of a run in the 90s with movies such as Backdraft, Stargate, Executive Decision, and the hidden gem that is Soldier from 1998. 

Also Read: 10 Most Watched TV Shows of All Time

Bruce Willis is John McClane from Die Hard… enough said. Ok, I will extend this a bit more than just that, but playing John McClane – one of the most famous action movie characters of all time – is more than enough to get him a spot on this list.

Bruce Willis is one of those actors who could do it all and the way he would turn into an action star is pretty awesome. He is a more believable “everyman” kind of action hero. From appearing in stuff like The Last Boy Scout, Striking Distance, and Last Man Standing, which are more “realistic” kind of action movies, Bruce Willis could also appear in movies like The Fifth Element and Armageddon which are more sci-fi/action. Bruce Willis was an A-list star for decades and that shows what a talented actor he was.

Look, Mel Gibson plays the roles of Mad Max and Martin Riggs from Lethal Weapon, that alone should make his spot on this top 10 action heroes of the 80s and 90s list a guarantee. Yet, in addition to these roles, Mel Gibson did feature in some really cool and epic action movies in these decades.

He is an actor who could do it all from action to drama to comedy. Heck in 1990 alone he appeared in Bird on a Wire, Air America, and freaking Hamlet! As the 90s moved into the mid and late 90s he would appear in two of what I think are his best action movies of this era, Ransom and Payback. Not only could Mel Gibson play the role of a believable badass, but he could also be a heartthrob and make you laugh or even make you cry as well! For many years and even now, Mel Gibson was and is a box office draw!

Also Read: 12 Revolutionary Female Actresses from the 70s

Ok, you may be thinking that Harrison Ford has made it this high on the list purely because he is Indiana Jones and Han Solo. However, to be honest, if that were the case, I would say playing those two roles for as many movies as he did would make his high spot more than worth it.

Harrison Ford is such a great actor, he can truly do it all. It is so easy to just think of him as Indiana Jones and Han Solo from the 80s. Yet, in the 90s he was such a badass in his roles as Jack Ryan in Patriot Games and Clear and Present Danger. Plus, the movies Air Force One and his reboot of The Fugitive were also awesome. Harrison Ford played a more believable kind of badass in his action movies during the 90s.

If my top 10 action heroes of the 80s and 90s list was just all about my own personal picks, JCVD would be number one as he was my action hero of this era. The 80s had him show off his epic martial arts moves in classics such as Bloodsport (one of my favorite movies of all time) and Kickboxer.

His run in the 90s was so much fun from getting to do a bit more acting in stuff like Death Warrant, playing two roles in Double Impact, and starring alongside Dolph Lundgren in the epic sci-fi action movie, Universal Soldier. The 90s also gave us the epic John Woo movie, Hard Target! He was a pretty big draw at the box office for much of the 90s and has a string of great ’80s and ’90s action movies to his filmography.  It is also pretty awesome how in recent times he has been having a blast poking fun at himself.

The fact that Sylvester Stallone made Rocky and Rambo movies during the 80s and 90s makes him one of the top tier action movie heroes not just of these two decades, but of all time. It would be so easy to just focus on Rocky and Rambo, but Stallone offered far more than that.

His movie Lock Up not only had great action, but it told an amazing story as well and he really got to flex his acting muscles here. Tango & Cash and Cobra are two 80s classics, but he also had some pretty big hits in the 90s too. Demolition Man and Assassins are two of the best from Stallone in that decade, but I do have to give special attention to Cop Land, which is such a great movie and a truly epic actual acting performance from him. Stallone is still going strong to this day and that is something we can all agree is awesome. 

If you grew up in the 80s and 90s, you loved Arnold Schwarzenegger! I would have deserved to have had a T-800 come back from the future to terminate me if I did not have Schwarzenegger at the top of my top 10 action heroes of the 80s and 90s list! That is actually a great place to start, The Terminator! The original is amazing, but in my humble opinion, Terminator 2 is the greatest sequel of all time.

However, the 80s saw him star in such greats as Commando, The Running Man, Predator, and the two Conan movies to just name a few. The 90s did not see him slow down either! Total Recall, Last Action Hero, True Lies, Eraser, and more were all a ton of fun. While Arnold Schwarzenegger was this big buff action hero, he had a ton of personality and his movies were always full of quotable lines such as the iconic “I’ll Be Back” that many people still use to this day. To say that he was box office gold in the 80s and 90s is about as big an understatement as the size of this man’s biceps! 

Also Read: 12 Unreleased Songs by Popular Artists You May Never Hear