The Expendables (Rotten Tomatoes: 41%) remains the Avengers of action movies. The all-time greats combined their powers across the series – except for one notable absentee: Steven Seagal. He never appeared at all. Instead, he has gone on to create his own Temu version of The Expendables.
There were talks about Seagal appearing in The Expendables 3 in 2013. Stallone himself posted on X in May 2013: “Just talked to Steven S. in Moscow… Sounds great and says he wants to be in EX3, if the part fits…”
Seagal also said something similar to IGN in December 2013. “Sly just called me the other day and said that they were still [interested],” he said. “And I said, ‘Hey buddy, you’re my friend, let me know.’ He said he was going to send me a script.”
Then, in an interview with The Big Issue in June 2014, Seagal revealed the reason he hadn’t joined the franchise. “I just didn’t like some of the people involved,” he said. “Life is too short to work with funny people.”
Well, Sylvester Stallone has now gone on to give his version of events during an appearance on The Rest Is Entertainment. When it was mentioned that Seagal turned down appearing in The Expendables, a visibly amused Stallone said, “Please… Please… Let’s just say he wasn’t invited to that party.”
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Host Marina Hyde tried to move on, but Stallone still wanted to talk about Seagal. “He turned us down? How about I tell you that he was begging to be in the show. Begging,” Stallone continued. “I shouldn’t get involved in it. Why lie like that?”
The conversation evolved into a discussion about Seagal in general. “I got nothing against Steven,” Stallone said. “We’ve had our moments. He had a real interesting thing going, and he took his life in that direction. I don’t even know if he does action films anymore. I think he lives in Russia. I wish him well.”
Hyde revealed to Stallone that Seagal continues to make action movies and even did a scene where he fought while sitting down. That part really cracked up Stallone, who replied, “I gotta try that. It’s a nice perk.”
In all fairness, even judging by Stallone’s previous social media posts, there were talks about Seagal joining The Expendables between the two parties. This doesn’t sound like a case of him failing to receive an invitation to the playground; instead, Seagal was forthcoming about issues he had with people involved in the franchise. Seagal has always been something of a prickly character in the entertainment industry, and he has a history of embellishing stories too, but this could be a situation where he isn’t lying at all. Gotta love showbiz and its spinning web of narratives!
The Expendables (2010) is available to rent or buy digitally on Amazon, Apple TV and YouTube.
The Expendables |
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A CIA operative hires a team of mercenaries to eliminate a Latin dictator and a renegade CIA agent. |
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| Studio: Millennium Films, Nu Image, Distributed by Lionsgate |
| Running Time: 103 minutes |
| Release Date: August 13, 2010 (United States) |
| Cast: Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Eric Roberts, Randy Couture, Steve Austin, David Zayas, Giselle Itié, Charisma Carpenter, Gary Daniels, Terry Crews, Mickey Rourke |
| Director: Sylvester Stallone |
| Writers: Sylvester Stallone, Dave Callaham |
| Genre: Action, Martial Arts |
| Box Office: $274.5 million |
