As the Chuck Norris myth spreads across the Internet, I have readily an unashamedly jumped on the bandwagon. I guess you could call me a sellout by doing so, but since I'm not making any actual money from it, the term wouldn't quite be accurate. I'm just a guy who likes his Internet fads, and Chuck Norris has replaced the whole "All your base are belong to us" thing as my inside joke for the past few months. I'm sure by next year my obsessions will shift to some sort of joke about a dwarf monkey smoking a cigar or something, but for right now I'm going to milk as much entertainment value as possible from Mr. Norris. If you don't like it, just smile and nod, and I'll eventually forget all about it. Anyway, the running gag right now is that Chuck Norris is simply the manliest man about. He's no Bruce Campbell yet, but he's carved out his own share of impressive wins. Now he'll be taking on ten fighters, in the pattern previously established by Shaft and Furious George.
Talk of the Tape (External link to YouTube.com)
Round One: Mike Tyson
Round one pits Chuck Norris against "Iron" Mike Tyson, a former boxing great who is now a bum (or, arguably, a former bum great who was once a boxer). Ever the proponent of fair play, Chuck decides to face off against Mike where the boxer has the most experience - in a boxing ring. Actually, Tyson probably has more experience in a jail cell, but with the problem of prison overcrowding these days, it's hard to find an empty cell to hold a good death match in. The bell rings, and Mike gets ready to take on his opponent. However, he's somewhat stymied by the fact that he's not fighting a woman or a child, and therefore doesn't know how to properly lay down a beating. Chuck, on the other hand, delivers a series of solid haymakers, followed by a quick roundhouse kick to finish off Mike Tyson. Round One goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Two: Timothy Olyphant
Timothy Olyphant is an actor from the television show Deadwood. I have no personal beef with him; his inclusion in this fight is purely based on the reaction I had when I saw the trailer to the movie Hitman, in which he plays Agent 47, one of the coolest video game characters of all time. The movie looks like it's going to completely butcher the concept, and so my immediate reaction was that someone, somewhere had to pay for that. What better way to get my revenge than to have Chuck Norris go after the star of the movie in an imaginary death match? Any other methods involve me landing in jail, you see.
So...
Chuck Norris punches Timothy Olyphant in the face. Then he does it again. And again. And again. It goes on like that until Timothy's face is a fine red paste. Sure, Timothy tries to fight back, but he's an actor; any potential badasses he plays are only roles in a movie. Round Two goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Three: Stephen Seagal
As a popular action hero of the 1980s, Stephen Seagal could just as easily have been the center of the current Internet craze as Chuck Norris. If only he had grown a beard, got some injections of testosterone, and added about eight inches to his manhood, he would be comparable to Chuck. But he can still get some fame and fortune as the guy who beats Chuck Norris. He goes at Chuck with all the skill that a bad action hero might possess. This proceeds to get him absolutely nowhere, as Chuck Norris has been in just as many bad action movies as Stephen Seagal. In terms of 80s cheese, it's a push. When Stephen Seagal doesn't score an easy victory, he does what he is known to do when a character of his isn't written to be invincible: he throws a massive hissy fit. He starts griping about creative integrity and threatens to hold out on his contract. Unfortunately for him, this fights section has no written contract for him to hold out on. Chuck Norris's fists, on the other hand, have an accountability clause that they exercise on Stephen Seagal's spleen. Round Three goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Four: Rambo
Yet another in a long line of cheesy action stars, John Rambo decides to make Chuck Norris his next target. He ambushed Chuck in the Florida everglades, where Mr. Norris is keeping animals off the endangered species list by threatening to show them what it really means to be endangered if they don't screw to keep their species alive. Rambo sneaks through the swamp until he's well within point blank range. Then he leaps out of hiding and sends a hail of bullets toward his foe. Chuck Norris turns around and gives the bullets a glare. Even though the ammunition is nonsentient, it still fears Chuck's glare. The bullets stop in midair, move to the side, and quietly let Chuck walk by, clattering to the ground uselessly once he's walked past them. Then Chuck gives Rambo a taste of the sole of his foot. Rambo goes down wondering why he ever decided to go from being a crazy disgruntled war vet to a full blown action hero in the first place. Round Four goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Five: Vin Diesel
If you rearrange the letters in Vin Diesel's name, you get "I take lives." He's even got a bunch of Internet groupies who, just like with Chuck Norris, have taken the Bill Brasky skits from Saturday Night Live and gone way too far with them, creating a whole archive of Vin Diesel "facts." But there's one fact that seems to be overlooked by most of these fans: Vin Diesel is a gamer. He plays Dungeons & Dragons, and he's got a video game company all his own. There are only two differences between Vin Diesel and the guy sitting behind the counter at your friendly local gaming shop. One is that Vin Diesel actually looks good. The other is that he's got the money to buy video game franchises and star in action movies. What it all boils down to is that he's always just pretending; every movie role is another role-playing opportunity to him. So when Chuck Norris comes to settle an old score, Vin Diesel is fumbling through his dice bag trying so he can do d8 blugeoning damage to his foe. That gets him enough points to make me want to invite him to my gaming table, but it doesn't do a thing against Chuck Norris. Roll the dice; it doesn't matter because all of Chuck's d20s always roll crits. No matter how high Vin boosts his AC, he's still got a fist through the face with a cowboy hat at the end of it. Round Five goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Six: Jackie Chan
Hey look, it's Jackie Chan! Not only one of the most skilled martial artists in the world, Jackie Chan is one of the better physical comedians out there, and can stretch and twist his body to impossible proportions, enduring a great deal of damage in the process. He's like an Asian version of Mr. Fantastic, but has the added perk of not being a fascist. He also makes the perfect foe for Chuck Norris, because he can take just about any amount of punishment without going down. When Chuck Norris kicks Jackie Chan in the face, his head snaps backwards to an impossible angle, but somehow he avoids breaking his neck. When Chuck uses a series of kidney punches to work Jackie's midsection, the flexible martial artist's internal organs rearrange themselves to keep the damage to a minimum. All the while, Jackie Chan rains his own series of blows down on Chuck Norris. Unfortunately, he underestimates Chuck's durability and speed. The battle lasts for hours, and Jackie Chan's flexibility eventually runs out. Chuck grabs hold of him and stretches his limbs out like Silly Putty. And like Silly Putty, Jackie Chan's natural stretchiness eventually runs out. Finally, Chuck Norris discards him and moves on. Jackie Chan lies unconscious, a mass of mangled flesh and twisted limbs that now only has the entertainment value of a bent slinky. Round Six goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Seven: Aragorn
We're running out of real manly men who can take on Chuck Norris, so we'll now have to resort to the manly men of fantasy literature. But not Conan -- having him an Chuck in the same place would give me testosterone poisoning. So we're going with the slightly less manly Aragorn -- or, if you want to use his much cooler name, Strider -- from The Lord of the Rings. Specifically, it's the movie version of Aragorn, which enables him to pull off all sorts of badass stunts that were just never described in the novel. Also, he can fall of cliffs and not die. That last part is really important, because the first thing Chuck Norris does is toss him off a cliff. When Aragorn gets up, Chuck tosses his off another cliff. And so on. But mere cliffs can't drop Aragorn -- he's a ranger! Firing himself up with a peppy battle speech about hope and friendship and magical butterflies and all that happy crap, he charges into battle. Alas for Aragorn, his movie incarnation has one serious weakness -- he's directed by Peter Jackson. Peter Jackson's way of making his characters look serious is to really overuse slow motion while telling his actors to hold one expression on their face for half an hour. Aragorn goes running in at his most serious, which means the slow-mo scene might last for days. Too bad for him he's only got about three seconds. Chuck Norris needs no slow motion clips; he's always serious. Serious enough to kill. Serious enough to grab Aragorn's sword, swallow it, spit out the broken fragments, reforge them into an even more badass weapon, and impale Aragorn on it, killing him. Sorry, Strider. Round Seven goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Eight: Superman
Superman has long been the official fall guy for this fights section. Perhaps because he's lost so often, he's slowly gained popularity in the polls, to the point where some people want him to win. Inspired by the newfound faith/pity in him, Superman decides to give it his all. He flies at lightning speed, moving fast enough to cause sonic booms. Every time he flies by Chuck Norris, he lays into the cowboy with a couple dozen haymakers. All the while, he uses his heat vision to keep the pressure on. Chuck feels his skin start to burn and he actually gets welts on his impervious skin from Superman's blows. Convinced that his foe is weakening, Superman flies in for the kill and...
Sorry, no. Superman doesn't win this time. Maybe someday in the future. Chuck Norris blows out the sun, extinguishing the source of Superman's abilities. Reduced to a normal man, Supes doesn't stand a chance, and Chuck gives him a warrior's death. Then he rubs his hands together until the friction reignites the sun. Round Eight goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Nine: The Juggernaut
The Juggernaut is a magically powered super villain who is super strong, invulnerable, and cannot be stopped once he gets forward momentum. Sensing a chance to make a name for himself, he charges Chuck Norris, yelling his signature line, "I'm the Juggernaut, bitch!" "No one stops the Juggernaut!" Chuck could test that theory, but he sees no need. The Juggernaut gets going, and Chuck just sidesteps his charge. Then he punches the Juggernaut in the back of the head, knocking his helmet off and sending him sprawling. Casually picking the Juggernaut up. huck Norris shotputs him into space, sending him hurdling straight through the center of the newly ignited sun. Round Nine goes to Chuck Norris.
Round Ten: Bruce Lee
After handily defeating nine different foes, you'd think Chuck is feeling pretty invincible. That would be true, but there's one battle he's still aching to fight: a matchup against his old mentor, Bruce Lee. Of course, Bruce Lee is dead, so the fight would be a bit one-sided if fought now. That's not a problem for Chuck Norris, though. He simply turns time backwards to when Bruce Lee was still alive, and goes after the master of jit kun do. And it's here that Chuck Norris meets his match. Unfortunately, nothing I can possibly write could be as funny or entertaining as watching one of Bruce Lee's actual fights. Fortunately, thanks to the magic of the Internet, I can actually steal a clip from Game of Death, and show you the actual results of a Bruce Lee/Chuck Norris fight:
See? It's like watching a ninja barn owl take on a gorilla. Well, maybe not. But anyway, my point is that not even Chuck Norris can overcome the screeching fury that is Bruce Lee. Round Ten and the match goes to Bruce Lee. Now who wants to start a BruceLeeFacts.com?