11 Badass Cop Actors Who Also Played Wimps in Other Movies

In Hollywood, playing the Badass, don’t-take-sh*t-from-nobody cop is almost a rite of passage for any career actor. The same can’t really be said for playing the wimpy, take-sh*t-from-pretty-much-everyone-and-like-it character. In fact, most tough guy actors have always tried to avoid those wimpy cop roles like the plague. But nowadays every action star also wants to own a restaurant, win an Oscar, and run for office, so they dabble in a little bit of everything, including the sensitive stuff. But in KoldCast TV’s comedic crime series Life is Just a Game, the character of Tommy Delniros, a cop, is both badass and emotional, and he grows on us because of it. Now take a gander at eleven actors who played a badass cop and had the cojones to give wimpy a try.

Life is Just a Game, Episode 1: Tommy Delniros

1. Bruce Willis – Die Hard and Death Becomes Her

As hard-nosed detective John McClane in the Die Hard series, Bruce Willis has spent over twenty years (on and off) playing what could possibly be the absolute ultimate badass cop to ever appear on the big screen. And, in the 1992 Robert Zemeckis comedy Death Becomes Her, he not only threw all that toughness right out the window, he backed over it with his car and flattened it like road kill. As a mostly spineless plastic surgeon tasked with keeping the rotting corpses of Meryl Streep and Goldie Hawn looking beautiful, his character spent the majority of the film getting pushed around and cowering behind his comical mustache.

2. Arnold Schwarzenegger – Raw Deal and Twins

Arnold has played a bevy of tough guys over the years, and more than a few of them have been cops. In my opinion though, the toughest of the tough was the slick-haired FBI agent from Raw Deal who gets kicked out of the FBI for roughing up a suspect. Sadly, two years after this testosterone fest Schwarzenegger played the character of Julius in 1998’s Twins. Although Julius was certainly capable of holding his own when push came to shove, Julius was also a bit of a nerd, a smidge of a dork, and just a hint of a wimp to boot. A 35 year old virgin really can’t be anything else, can he?

3. Eddie Murphy – Beverly Hills Cop and Bowfinger

In Beverly Hills Cop, Detective Axel Foley was a badass mostly because of his mouth and his attitude. Physically, Eddie Murphy, who played Foley, wasn’t really intimidating at all – to anyone. Though his methods were unusual, Foley had a knack for getting the job done. But as Jiff in 1999’s Bowfinger, Murphy moved as far away from Axel Foley as he could possibly get. A clueless lookalike for a Hollywood action icon, Jiff was as bumbling, earnest, and moronically simple as they come.

4. Danny Glover – Predator 2 and The Royal Tenenbaums

The obvious choice for a Danny Glover-played badass cop would have to be his character in the Lethal Weapon series, right? In my opinion though, he’s much more imposing when he’s single-handedly killing a dreadlocked, shoulder-cannon-wielding alien hunter, while dealing with a scene chewing Gary Busey – so I’m going with Predator 2. For as tough as Glover was as the cop who stabbed an alien in the guts, he was equally as wimpy as the clutzy accountant Henry Sherman in Wes Anderson’s The Royal Tenenbaums. Of course, Henry wasn’t a complete wimp. He did face down Royal Tenenbaum when Royal called him “Coltrane.” So that’s something – I guess. It’s not as badass as killing an alien though. Not even close.

5. Sylvester Stallone – Demolition Man and Cop Land

Sylvester Stallone has played his fair share of tough cops over the years – Lieutenant Cobretti in Cobra, Ray Tango in Tango and Cash, John Spartan in Demolition Man – heck, one might even toss the marble-mouthed Judge Dredd onto the list. But, as Freddy Heflin in 1997’s Cop Land, Stallone went from the super-tough to the super-not-so-tough in the blink of an eye. Sure, Freddy and his oversized belly stand up to the bad guys in the end and ultimately prove that you can’t judge a book by its cover, but a single moment of bravery and an unexpected seven or so minutes of crazy-cuckoo bloodshed doesn’t completely erase the hour and forty-five minutes of extreme wimp-abilities that came before the blood.

6. Nicholas Cage – Face Off and Adaptation

In what is arguably the best American-produced film ever made by legendary Hong Kong director John Woo, Nicholas Cage starred as both a badass cop, and an equally badass psychotic criminal in 1997’s Face Off – and he played both characters pretty damn well. Just six years later Cage was playing two characters in the same film once again – the brothers Kaufman in the Spike Jonze-directed, beautiful mindf**k of a film that was Adaptation. As the character of Charlie, a tortured, socially inept writer with a bountiful harvest of wimp characteristics, Cage proved that he had remarkable range. Then the National Treasure movies arrived – and Ghost Rider – and The Wicker Man. Cage has never been the same.

7. Gene Hackman – The French Connection and Get Shorty

When you think of the toughest cops to ever snarl at a bad guy on the silver screen, the name “Popeye” Doyle just has to pop into your head. Super-actor Gene Hackman played the character with a ferociousness and realism that simply couldn’t be matched, and the character has remained notable, and classic, because of it. Over twenty years later, Hackman brought the same gusto to an altogether different character – the admittedly slimy, yet undeniably wimpy Hollywood producer Harry Zimm in Get Shorty.

8. John Travolta – Face Off and Hairspray

As both Sean Archer and Castor Troy, John Travolta gave us a double-dose of badass alongside Nicholas Cage. Then came 2007, a wig, a fat suit, a hefty set of fake boobs, and a husband played by Christopher Walken – in Hairspray. Travolta’s surprising turn into the agoraphobic mother of an optimistic, overweight teenager is as far removed from badass characters like Sean Archer as he could have possibly gone. While one could make an argument that Edna Turnblad wasn’t exactly “wimpy” in the context of her own little world, she wasn’t really all that “tough” either – at least not for the likes of legend John Travolta. Did she ever get her face chopped off?

9. Gary Oldman – Leon: The Professional and Nobody’s Baby

Without a doubt, Gary Oldman has been one of the most underrated actors in the history of the medium. In the 1994 Luc Besson-directed action flick Leon: The Professional, Gary played bad guy cop Norman Stansfield, one of the absolute most badass crazy cops in the long and storied history of badass crazy cops. Every moment Oldman was on the screen was absolutely riveting – in a frightening sort of way. But in 2001’s David Seltzer-directed Nobody’s Baby, however, Gary “the chameleon” Oldman is nearly unrecognizable as the cowboy-hat-wearing, square-dancing, sweet-mustache-sporting Buford Dill.

10. Russell Crowe – L.A. Confidential and A Beautiful Mind

1997’s L.A. Confidential introduced the world at large to Russell Crowe. It also introduced us to the burly, short-tempered, sweaty-faced cop he was playing, Officer Wendell “Bud” White. In the film, Crowe’s demeanor is as sharp as his crew cut and his fists seem to enjoy punching bad guys in the face. Then, in 2002’s Ron Howard-directed A Beautiful Mind, and with remarkable ease, Crowe went from badass tough guy to wimpy super brain and even earned himself a few award nominations for his skills. And his risk-taking paid off.

11. Tim Roth – Reservoir Dogs and Four Rooms

In Quentin Tarantino’s Reservoir Dogs, Tim Roth played a gutsy cop that went undercover, got shot during a robbery, watched as a fellow officer had his ear chopped off, and found himself getting a wee bit too close to his new criminal friends. The performance was gritty, dark, and badass. Then came the 1995 anthology Four Rooms, and with it, the quirky, jittery bellhop named Ted. Because he was part of two badass classics like Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction, we’ll have to forgive Pumpkin on this one.

Life is Just a Game, Episode 2: Secret Mission

Life is Just a Game, Episode 3: Soul Searching

Watch more episodes of Life is Just a Game.

Steven Novak is a writer, illustrator, graphic designer and admitted lifelong nerd with an embarrassingly large DVD collection. He is currently working and living in the Southern California desert. His most recent fantasy/action adventure novel, “Forts: Fathers and Sons,” is available everywhere books are sold.