Well, it hasn’t hurt Chuck Norris. What I love about that TV series is everything is cured with a chop to the throat or a knee to the midsection. “Oh, you’re a pedophile... CHOP! You’re cured!” “Oh, you’re a lifelong crack head? POW! You’re clean now with my super kick to your bone zone.” Seriously, I love Chuck, he’s always been a great gentleman, but in action films, how else do we complete a physical morality play without calling on the tried and true eye-for-an-eye? Imagine if you’re tracking a lifelong serial killer, you break into his house and on his wall are 35 heads of homeless women. Do you shoot him, stab him or read his palm and suggest it’s really not his fault… he’s the victim of bad karma and you give him the name of a qualified therapist. No, you make him an unwilling member of the “splat pack” by plastering his remains against the nearest stucco wall. The controversy has been negative and the only way to balance out the violent reactions is to delve more profoundly into what makes them tick and that perhaps can make sense of their tactics.
