The 12 Worst Arnold Schwarzenegger Movies Ranked

To be clear from the outset, Arnold Schwarzenegger is one of the most iconic and beloved actors in the world. Throughout the '80s and '90s, Schwarzenegger practically redefined the action movie genre, headlining numerous blockbusters and launching franchises that continue to thrive decades later. More than just starring in the vastly underrated "Last Action Hero," Schwarzenegger embodied the archetype that the 1993 movie celebrated.

But we're not here to talk about the best Arnold Schwarzenegger films this time.

Even an actor as renowned and popular as Schwarzenegger has made some genuine misfires over the course of his extensive career. It's simple calculus that, for an actor who's been working diligently since the '70s, that a handful of movies won't be up to standard. To clarify, this list focuses on Schwarzenegger in starring roles, rather than cameos or similarly brief supporting roles he's held over the years.

Here are the 12 worst Arnold Schwarzenegger movies, ranked down to the weakest of the Austrian Oak's cinematic projects.

Buoyed by the success of movies like "Conan the Barbarian" and "The Terminator," Schwarzenegger was one of the biggest action stars by the mid '80s. However, his winning streak was temporarily disrupted by the 1986 crime action flick "Raw Deal," with Schwarzenegger playing disgraced FBI agent Mark Kaminski. Forced to become a small-town sheriff, Kaminski is given a chance at redemption when approached to participate in an unsanctioned undercover operation. This places Kaminski deep inside a Chicago mob syndicate and on a collision course with the federal prosecutor who derailed his career years prior.

The gravest sin that an action movie can commit is being boring, and it's a gaffe that several movies on this list make, including "Raw Deal." Nobody watches a Schwarzenegger movie to see him unconvincingly go undercover as a mobster which is, unfortunately, what the bulk of this film is. Even the climactic shootout as Kaminski single-handedly dismantles the mob outfit he's infiltrated feels lackluster in its execution. A weak, low-budget thriller that fails to thrill, the only people getting a "Raw Deal" here is the audience.

Many of Schwarzenegger's various characters have had on-screen sidekicks over the years, but among the more eyebrow-raising is Johnny Knoxville in "The Last Stand." The 2013 movie has Schwarzenegger play Arizona sheriff Ray Owens, still haunted by his time in the LAPD as he looks over his sleepy border town. Owens is forced to shake his ennui when a runaway drug lord (Eduardo Noriega) tries to make a break for the Mexico border. Owens mounts a desperate defense against the incoming small army with his deputies and unhinged gun collector Lewis Dinkum (Knoxville).

To be fair, "The Last Stand" is better than much of Schwarzenegger's action movie output since serving as the Governor of California, but that's not saying all that much. The formula is as tired and derivative as it gets, with Knoxville doing much of the heavy lifting in terms of injecting life into this project. A flop in its theatrical release, the movie found a second life on streaming as a passable popcorn flick. But given the prestige of Schwarzenegger's prior work, passable just doesn't cut it for an icon who revolutionized a genre that this movie limply tries to evoke.

Another hiccup during Schwarzenegger's '80s heyday is 1985's "Red Sonja," loosely adapting the dark fantasy character by "Conan" creator Robert E. Howard. Despite the shared creative source, Schwarzenegger doesn't reprise his role as Conan, but instead plays the new character Lord Kalidor. Kalidor teams up with Sonja (Brigitte Nielsen) in seizing her revenge against the villainous Queen Gedren (Sandahl Bergman) after she is raped by the Queen's troops. Meanwhile, Gedren is driven mad by a stolen magical talisman which is poised to completely devastate the surrounding kingdom.

Though some consider "Red Sonja" among the best sword and sorcery movies, I'm going to respectfully disagree with that assessment for the simple reason that this movie is complete garbage. Schwarzenegger is playing second fiddle to Nielsen and doesn't even show up until much later in the movie, with Nielsen's dull acting failing to instill any excitement into the proceedings. Tonally, the movie is all over the place, particularly since the movie opens with sexual assault, and continues to take itself way too seriously. A leaden mess, it's a shame that Schwarzenegger's third '80s fantasy adventure is an amateurish slog.

Schwarzenegger has always been game to subvert his action hero image in his comedic projects like "Twins" and "Jingle All the Way," which have a certain appeal. That appeal doesn't extend to the 1994 screwball comedy "Junior," starring Schwarzenegger as fertility drug scientist Alex Hesse. At the suggestion of his colleague Larry Arbogast (Danny DeVito), Hesse impregnates himself with a donated ovum to continue research into an experimental drug. Not only does this radical experiment work, but Hesse decides to carry the child to term, dating fellow scientist and the ovum's donor Diana Reddin (Emma Thompson).

Look, none of Schwarzenegger's comedies are high cinema, but "Junior" is on a completely lower level than his other humorous efforts. The movie was an effort to replicate the surprise box office smash success of "Twins," Schwarzenegger and DeVito's previous project with director and producer Ivan Reitman. Commercial lightning did not strike twice, with audiences and critics put off by the bizarre concept and one-note jokes on the prospect of seeing Schwarzenegger pregnant. Despite this, the movie somehow garnered an Academy Award nomination, for Best Original Song, an odd distinction for a movie with a CG baby that nightmarishly has Schwarzenegger's face.

One of Schwarzenegger's darkest roles is in the 2014 action thriller "Sabotage," directed, produced, and co-written by David Ayer. Schwarzenegger plays John "Breacher" Wharton, the leader of a spec ops DEA team who raid a drug cartel base. The team steals and stashes away $10 million from the syndicate and avoids prosecution despite attracting the suspicion of their superiors. Months later, the team is systematically picked off one-by-one, with Breacher working with the police under the assumption that the cartel is behind the gruesome murders in retaliation.

So many of Schwarzenegger's movies are packed with violence, with more than few elevating the graphic depiction of the carnage. But in "Sabotage," the level of on-screen brutality feels more excessive and sadistic compared to Schwarzenegger's other work. This completely throws the movie's tone off-balance, especially for something positioned as a high-octane whodunit with an obvious culprit. Though "Sabotage" has its B-movie defenders, the film is an unpleasant watch for audiences expecting Schwarzenegger's usual popcorn-friendly fare.

By the late '90s, Schwarzenegger's box office clout was on the decline and he tried to reinvent his reputation with 2000's "The 6th Day." The movie takes place in a near-future where cloning technology is widely available, though human cloning remains strictly banned. Schwarzenegger plays pilot Adam Gibson, who returns home only to find a clone of himself cavorting with his family. In trying to discover what happened, Gibson stumbles across a wider conspiracy by cloning tech mogul Michael Drucker (Tony Goldwyn). This leads Gibson and his clone to battle Drucker and his henchmen when their family is targeted by the menacing tycoon.

"The 6th Day" was an attempt for Schwarzenegger to play a more fully rounded protagonist than his prior work, but the movie itself is still a formulaic action flick. Worse yet, in trying to make a smart sci-fi action movie, the story is as contrived and nonsensical as it gets the more that one thinks about it. To top it off, double the Schwarzeneggers does not equal double the fun, with the action falling flat in its execution. "The 6th Day" failed to turn around Schwarzenegger's diminishing success, though he did pocket a cool $25 million for starring in the forgotten sci-fi flop.

A real-life 2002 mid-air collision between a passenger jet and cargo plane serves as the narrative basis for the 2017 revenge drama "Aftermath." Schwarzenegger stars as Roman Melnyk, a construction worker who loses his wife and pregnant wife to a mid-air crash between two planes. Melnyk holds the air traffic controller on duty, Jake Bonanos (Scoot McNairy) responsible and begins plotting his revenge. Meanwhile, Bonanos, a family man himself, is overcome with guilt over the accident despite being cleared of wrongdoing by the subsequent investigation.

With its real world tragedy source material and the direction that it takes its own story, "Aftermath" feels a bit exploitative. Schwarzenegger does a fine enough job as the grieving Melnyk, but the overall project feels like a shoddy low-budget piece of work. Though providing Schwarzenegger with a deeper role, "Aftermath" never rises above its distinction as poorly made award season bait that never lives up to its dramatic ambitions. It's no grand surprise that "Aftermath" saw only a limited theatrical release as there is little quality to be had from the human misery it's mired in.

Younger audiences might not be aware of this, but the action movie genre, in particular, was in a weird and uncertain place in the immediate aftermath of 9/11. The Schwarzenegger-led "Collateral Damage" was punted from its planned October 2001 release date to February 2002 and heavily retooled its marketing campaign given that the movie centers around terrorist attacks. Schwarzenegger plays firefighter Gordon Brewer, who loses his wife and son to a terrorist bombing in Los Angeles linked to a Colombian paramilitary group. Traveling to Colombia for revenge, Brewer returns to the States when he learns the terrorists are planning an elaborate attack on Washington, D.C.

Apart from its unfortunate release timing and funny anecdotes from Bill Hader, who worked on the movie as a production assistant, there's nothing special about "Collateral Damage." Even with its subject matter and revenge story, the terrorists never feel more than the one-note baddies Schwarzenegger usually dispatches. The action itself is as uninspired as it gets, likely watered down in hasty edits after 9/11 and the delayed release. Another failed attempt to reinvigorate Schwarzenegger's career in the 21st century, "Collateral Damage" is best left forgotten.

Filmmaker Taran Killam's feature directorial debut was writing, directing, and producing the 2017 action mockumentary "Killing Gunther," with Killam also starring alongside Schwarzenegger. Gunther Bendik (Schwarzenegger) is the world's most infamous assassin, and the vengeful hitman Blake (Killam) hires a filming crew to document him killing his rival. Blake forms a crack team of specialists to take Gunther out, only to find that the venerable mercenary is still as deadly as ever. Picking off Blake's ensemble one-by-one, Gunther moves to Blake's lost love Lisa (Cobie Smulders) in an effort to get Blake to back down.

The mockumentary angle to "Killing Gunther" is both the movie's unique hook and a feature that overstays its welcome. The action is effectively and deliberately over-the-top, but even that aspect feels increasingly tired as the movie progresses. But most trying of all is the fact that this action comedy isn't all that funny to begin with, even with a self-aware performance from Schwarzenegger. A one-note movie that never knows when to change up its gags, "Killing Gunther" feels like it could've benefited immensely from at least one more significant rewrite.

On paper, the idea of Arnold Schwarzenegger going mano-a-mano against Satan seems like a slam dunk blockbuster concept. However, in execution, 1999's "End of Days" fails to capitalize on this premise, amounting to a sloppy mess of a motion picture. Schwarzenegger's character is Jericho Cane, a former New York police detective grieving the tragic loss of his wife and daughter. As a new millennium approaches, Cane becomes the world's best hope from stopping Satan (Gabriel Byrne) from conceiving the prophesied Antichrist.

"End of Days" is one of those movies that masochists, like myself, watch to appreciate the unintentional humor in its shoddy delivery. The movie is one of Schwarzenegger's visual effects-heavy outside of the "Terminator" franchise, but it's clumsily rendered and hasn't aged well at all. Dating the movie even worse is the prevalence of nu-metal in its soundtrack, usually in the uneven action set pieces. Perhaps worst of all, "End of Days" introduced the recurring Schwarzenegger trope of his characters motivated by the loss of his family, and that alone earns it a spot here.

Released under numerous titles overseas, most notably in the United States as "Iron Mask," this 2019 fantasy movie was released in its native Russia as "Viy 2: Journey to China." A sequel to the 2014 movie "Viy," the story has 18th century cartographer Jonathan Green (Jason Flemyng) embark on an epic journey to, well, China. Schwarzenegger plays the literal Captain Hook, who is a two-handed jailor in this flick, while Jackie Chan plays an imprisoned master wizard named Et Al. Green sets out to clear Et Al's name and overthrow an evil queen leading an army of dark wizards.

Despite the level of their billing in the credits and prominent appearances in the movie's marketing, Schwarzenegger and Chan aren't in "Iron Mask" all that much. This is definitely for the best because the vast majority of "Iron Mask" is just an incomprehensible slog. It feels like the production budget primarily went towards Schwarzenegger and Chan's limited participation, because the visual effects are laughably bad, right down to the obvious green screen environments. Cheaply made and nonsensically put together, "Iron Mask" is a blemish on both Schwarzenegger and Chan's cinematic legacies.

If you know anything about Schwarzenegger's filmography or acting career beginnings, you probably expected "Hercules in New York" to appear somewhere on this list. The 1970 fantasy comedy was Schwarzenegger's very first on-screen acting gig, initially credited as Arnold Strong, though subsequent home video releases utilized Arnold's true last name. Schwarzenegger plays the titular ancient Greek god who defies his father to visit humanity on Earth, landing in New York City and getting into all sorts of mischief. While Hercules away from Olympus, his rival deities plot to steal the God of Strength's divine might and leave him vulnerable on Earth.

"Hercules in New York" is one of the worst-rated movies in IMDb, with this dubious reputation justly earned. The 1970 flick is laughably low-rent and the fish-out-of-water gags around Hercules has its humor primarily derived unintentionally from Schwarzenegger's acting inexperience. That said, that appeal only goes so far and whenever Schwarzenegger is off-screen there's nothing saving this trainwreck. Worth watching only as highlight clips for the novelty of a young Schwarzenegger, "Hercules in New York" shows the actor's roots and how tremendously far he's come.