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Notes -
Kind of a shower thought, but could it be that it's just really hard to write an interesting, unique badass hero nowadays without being excoriated for toxic masculinity and being retrograde? Indiana Jones and Han Solo get grandfathered in as endearing classics of a bygone age, so you get a pass if you recycle them (although you probably have to pay some tribute to wokeness in the form of retcons and script changes).
Perhaps also there's also a suspension of disbelief problem. Millennials and zoomers are permanently on seven layers of irony and have grown up on endless trope subversion. How could you write a straight action hero who would appeal to such an audience?
That's something I noticed too. It seems like the answer is Die Hard. Your action star is completely self effacing about his remarkable skills, he gets forced into saving the day by the bad guys, and he perserveres through great hardship to do so. John Wick, Nobody, Olympus has Fallen, White House Down, Taken, The Nice Guys, probably others I've forgotten, they've all been pretty popular doing this.
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