Bruce Willis parodied his tough role in a forgotten action comedy

By the end of the 1980s, the action genre was primed for parody. The decade spawned the muscle-bound action hero, who by the early 1990s had already become an archetype in the wider culture. So, you'd think something like “National Lampoon's Loaded Weapon 1” would be a comedy hit when it debuted in 1993. Unfortunately, it didn't quite work out that way.

The film stars Emilio Estevez as Sgt. Jack Colt, a parody of Mel Gibson's Martin Riggs from the Lethal Weapon movies. Samuel L. Jackson plays his reluctant partner, Sgt. Wes Luger, himself a parody of Danny Glover's Roger Murtaugh. Together, the LAPD duo embark on a mission to solve the murder of their fellow officer, Sgt. Billy York (Whoopi Goldberg), which is basically just an excuse for the movie to screw up the action genre as a whole.

Throughout the film, the writers film all the popular action franchises of the time, from Sylvester Stallone's Rambo to Arnold Schwarzenegger's attempt to outdo his longtime rival with “Commando.” Unfortunately, none of this generated much critical reaction. “Loaded Weapon 1” has a score of 21% Rotten tomatoeswhere the critical consensus accuses the film of being “a tired parody that cycles through its laundry list of references with little comedic touch”. As a result, this is one National Lampoon movie that has been largely forgotten.

But among the “tired parody” is one hilarious cameo from none other than Bruce Willis himself, appearing as a version of what is arguably his most famous character.

The “Lethal Weapon” movies. were already quite over the top and more than aware of their excess, which makes parodying them a bit of a challenge – one that critics say Loaded Weapon 1 failed to overcome. But if all you saw was Bruce Willis cameoyou'd think the movie was at least kind of amusing.

The short scene shows Willis playing an obvious version of his “Die Hard” character John McClane crawling out of the wreckage of his trailer home after it's blown up by a goon who mistook it for Emilio Estevez's Sgt. Jack Colt. Although he is not mentioned by name, the character is wearing the same vest that Willis made famous in his 1988 action film debut, with Willis waving a makeshift white flag before emerging from the flames and shouting at the attacker: “What the hell are you doing ?”

Although Willis is on screen for all of 30 seconds, his appearance might be the best in this forgotten action comedy. According to IMDbthe actor even appears on the cover of the international VHS release, which, judging by the overall reaction to the film, was at least worth trying to convince people to buy the thing.