Does anyone who isn’t a Hollywood executive, or Samuel L. Jackson, think that Samuel L. Jackson is cool?  How did he create this cool stigma? Was it by being bald, black and dropping f-bombs? That’s totally his thing that he does; is that what passes for cool these days? I just don’t get it. Honestly, it’s like I’m taking crazy pills here.

Last night I went and saw Iron Man, which was super awesome. On the way in, one of the ladies who worked at the theater said “make sure you watch through the credits, there’s another scene at the end.” The scene, as it turns out, is Tony Stark meeting Nick Fury - the head of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Let’s take a look at Nick Fury:

In Iron Man, Nick Fury is portrayed by Samuel L. Jackson.

Now I get why this decision was made. The producers wanted to make this scene super bad-ass, and get everyone all fired up for Iron Man II, or maybe The Avengers. The problem is that SLJ isn’t BA. And Nick Fury isn’t a sassy black man. So why force it?

In Pulp Fiction SLJ was a bad-ass - but that’s about it. Take a look at his movie credits. Since 1994, when Pulp Fiction came out, SLJ’s entire career has consisted of cameos as a  bad-ass. That’s 14 years of playing the same character over, and over, and over in increasingly bad movies. It’s become a cliche; if you’re making a movie, and you need a bad-ass, hire SLJ. That’s all there is to it. Need a BA Jedi? Hire SLJ. Need a BA cop “on the edge”? Hire SLJ.

I blame Pulp Fiction. Without Pulp Fiction, SLJ would never have become - in massive sarcasm quotes - “ultramegacool“. Neither would John Travolta.  While an awesome movie, Pulp Fiction is totally to blame for making SLJ and John Travolta cool. The number of truly terrible movies spawned by the resurgence of those two actors is staggering. All things considered, movies as a whole would be a lot better had Pulp FictionI never happened, and Iron Man would have been better without SLJ.