This Is The Worst Steven Seagal Movie Of All Time

According to Plato's Theory of Forms, there is a perfect, conceptual version of anything you could imagine, separate from the real world but encapsulating all physical examples of itself. There is an ideal Table to which all other tables only aspire. An all-encompassing Lamp that cannot exist in the physical realm, but within which exists the very essence of being a lamp. But maybe, from time to time, one such perfect Form breaks through to our side of existence. Maybe, flying in the face of the laws that hold the universe together, the one true example of a Marshmallow-Person-Who-Takes-Himself-Too-Seriously broke through to this realm of imperfect substance. Maybe that's how we got Steven Seagal.

Seagal has never been a safe bet, quality-wise. Over the course of a career that started during the Reagan administration and, in deference to sanity, continues to this day, he's been in four movies with "fresh" ratings on Rotten Tomatoes. In the time it took the rest of the world to cycle through seven big screen Batmans, he's made four movies that at least six out of ten critics found watchable.

Of course, you don't go to Monster Jam to hear poetry, and you don't drunkenly Redbox a Steven Seagal movie to enjoy it sincerely. You do it for the sweaty lack of self-awareness, and the sense of communal pain shared with your fellow viewers. And nothing hurts worse than Contract to Kill.

Contract to Kill would be indistinguishable from every other VOD Seagal joint, except for one important distinction: It's the only one honored with a nigh-unobtainable 0% Rotten Tomatoes score. It sees Seagal playing John Harmon, an operative pulling double duty for the CIA and DEA, because he's just that good. With the help of an ex-lover 37 years his junior, he hunts frightening brown people who are doing drug things across the US, Mexico, and Istanbul, all of which look suspiciously similar to Romania, a country which, on an unrelated note, offers some pretty wild film tax credits, according to the Hollywood Reporter.

Yes, Steven Seagal is an easy target. He's puffy, pushing seventy, and about half a dozen off-ramps past his prime. It's been a decade since the last time he was in a wide release movie, and two decades since he was in one un-ironically. However, one should also remember that Seagal has claimed to be both a secret CIA operative and the reincarnation of a Buddhist monk/treasure hunter, according to Palyul Ling International. He killed a puppy (and over 100 roosters) after driving a tank into somebody's property, according to the A.V. Club. He abandoned his son, Kentaro, who won't talk to him today. He's been accused of myriad acts of awfulness over the years by ex-wives, production assistants, personal assistants, co-stars, auditioning actresses, and one time, Lorne Michaels. Saying that his movies suck feels acceptable.