Of all the names who have been attached to the Expendables franchise, there has been one particularly glaring omission thus far…Michael Dudikoff. Oh, and there’s also been Steven Seagal. He’s often been rumoured but things have never materialised. One belief was that Seagal had felt himself above the project, or that he isn’t keen on ensemble films, but thinking with a bit more logic and a bit more research it becomes fairly obvious this wouldn’t be the case. Seagal may be blessed with an ego that’s hard to match, but he’s also blessed with sense, and appearing in The Expendables will help his career and also mark a nice change of pace (and budget) from the cheap action films and TV he’s doing at the moment. He was also willing to appear in Machete.
With a scoop courtesy of Roth Cornet over at IGN, who spoke to Seagal himself, it seems, as many suspected, that movie politics were the key factor in Seagal’s no show so far. He has a well-publicised feud with Avi Lerner and Millennium/Nu Image films. Seagal stated there were “unpleasant politics with certain folks, not the actors.” So it seems if the chance arises he’ll muck in with his contemporaries, whilst it seems he still gets on well with Stallone. Seagal added, “Hopefully we’ve gone beyond that (the previous roadblocks). Sly just called me the other day and said that they were still interested. And I said, ‘Hey buddy, you’re my friend, let me know.’ He said he was going to send me a script.”
So who knows? There may still be pick up shots to do. The Bruce Willis and Arnold Schwarzenegger cameo in the first film was shot after principal photography had ended. Seagal could be added in, or another idea could be to introduce him in a similar way to Jason Statham in the Fast & Furious franchise, by having him appear post credits to pave the way for his role in the fourth picture. There’s a suggestion from Seagal’s conversation with Sly that a script for the next one is already in the works, indeed both sequels were being written long before the previous films had come out, so sure of success were they.
With the likes of Stallone and Schwarzenegger struggling at the box-office in non-franchise pictures, should The Expendables 3 rake in the cash like the first two, then another sequel is inevitable. There are also still a plethora of big names who could be added to the rotating line up, and in terms of the big screen comeback slot, first taken by Dolph Lundgren in the first, Jean-Claude Van Damme in the second, and Wesley Snipes in the third, the next logical step would be Seagal in the fourth.
The Expendables 3 is set for release on August 15th 2014.
Originally published December 21, 2013. Updated April 11, 2018.
