Better Actor: Steven Seagal or Dolph Lundgren?

I don't think I can really vote because I haven't seen that many Lundgren films tbh and I love Under Siege (1992) out of all proportion but that's for TL Jones......I'll say this though - I'm tempted to vote for Lundgren just for how Seagal's hairpiece (?) looks in that photo.....

Dolph. 

He is actually a surprisingly decent actor. It's easy to think of him as an overly muscled meathead, and he has played a lot of roles that fit into that stereotype, but he's done underrated work as the first screen version of The Punisher. A great antagonist in Universal Soldier. The evolution of his iconic Ivan Drago character in Creed 2 was fantastic. He gave a genuinely tragic performance as an older, bitter Drago.

He tried his best as He-Man in Masters Of The Universe, though the film kinda sucked.

He actually acted a sleepwalking  Willem Dafoe off the screen in Aquaman, giving one of the film's more notable performances as a Sea King.

Seagal is much more one-note and one dimensional than Dolph as an actor. And Seagal's stoic badass routine became a lot harder to take seriously when he got fat.

I definitely agree. I think Lundgren is pretty underappreciated as an actor. He always tries to bring something different with each character he portrays and adapts to the needs of the film, whereas Seagal does the exact same thing in each of his roles. Even in Machete, where he plays the bad guy, he does the same stoic badass routine, without any variety. The only film I find him quite fun in is Under Siege.

Dolph Lundgren in Universal Soldier is glorious. GLORIOUS!

Eh, I hardly care for any of them but Dolph has more charisma. In fact, he was almost the best thing about "Creed 2" recently. Seagal is boring all around, he makes the same expression and same dull line deliveries every time. Bit off-topic maybe but as a martial arts actor, he was also among the most boring in the world. Only "Exit Wounds" had a little interesting choreography but it was obvious that they try too hard to get an exciting fight scene out of Seagal's skills.

Among those western action stars of the era, I'll come up with an unpopular opinion and claim that Mark Dacascos was the one with most range. Not sure even if he's a "star" or not, considering he was more famous in Europe than US and most of his filmography are B-movies or major flops but still.

He's pretty great in "Crying Freeman" (1995) from the same director and a very compelling action leading man in "Drive" (1997) where he gets to do Hong Kong style martial arts scenes. Some very nice comic timing too ("Double Dragon" is often considered to be one of the worst films of the decade but he's fun). Very good in "Only the Strong" (1993), "Boogie Boy" (1998) and was very cool in "The Crow" series. He also makes good villains even though they never used his potential to full. Most recently he was a delight in "John Wick 3".

I'll take you Dacascos and raise you Brandon Lee.

Lee was phenomenal in The Crow. It's a performance that almost came out of nowhere, since most of his previous work was as a B-list action star riding off his great father, Bruce Lee's name in things like Showdown In Little Tokyo (co-starring the actor of this thread, Dolph Lundgren) and Rapid Fire.

Based on The Crow, I think Lee had the potential to be put in the same casting bracket as the likes of Johnny Depp and Brad Pitt. I agree that Dacascos was one of the better action stars in terms of actual acting ability, but I never saw him as having that level of potential that Lee showed with that one performance. A real shame Lee died on the set of The Crow. His future career became a big what if?

For the poll, without hesitation I voted for Dolph Lundgren. He definitely is thought of as an overly muscled meathead if one didn't know about his personal life, but he always gives it his all to me even when he's starring in schlock. On the other hand, the only movie where I've felt that Seagal actually tried to act was Under Siege, and I'd like to think it was just the talent around him that helped elevate him. Even in okay stuff like Hard to Kill, Kelly "Don't Hate Me Because I'm Beautiful" Lebrock made more of an impression, and I only remember her because of one the jokes that she said in it that stuck in my juvenile, dirty mind at the time while I've probably forgotten most of the stuff I learned when I was in that grade at the time, lol. With his other stuff before Under Siege, I don't even remember anything about him except I think he always played a detective that bad guys, usually drug dealers or maybe dirty cops wanted to kill, and actors that you wish the movie revolved around like Pam Grier, Sharon Stone, Willam Sadler, William Forsythe, Jerry Orbach, etc. would pop up in them. 

I think that's a small part of why Under Siege seemed so great to me besides being a great movie is that it sort of had the same plot of bad guys trying to kill his character, but at least it mixed it up a little by having him be a cook in the Navy, who of course was more than that, and it wasn't quite drug dealers or dirty cops trying to kill him. 

OT: Too true about Brandon Lee. He was so handsome, and had tons of charisma. It's a fucking tragedy what happened to his family. 

Showdown in Little Tokyo used to be one of my guilty pleasures. It's just so much campy fun, and one of Tia Carrere's jokes is another one of those things that stuck in my dirty mind at the time. 

Speaking of Carrere, I'm not going to say that she was a great actress, but I feel if she weren't considered "ethnic" by Hollywood that she would have been cast more in rom-coms where I think she would have really exceeded more because she had a lot of warmth as an actress. I know she got Wayne's World and the sequel where she played the love interest, but then she got cast in these action films or any part that called for someone that was basically Asian or Asian American, or Hawaiian. Maybe she liked doing action films, but she's another actor that I feel that Hollywood never quite what to do with after her initial breakout and got type cast. 

Tia disappeared incredibly fast. In 1994, she was in something big like "True Lies" and just a year later she was suddenly in bunch of direct-to-video action films. And I had a brief crush on her that I remember checking some of her less known works; and even enjoyed one of them called "The Immortals" opposite Eric Roberts. As you've said, not a great actress maybe but she had a lovely presence.

I actually had that comparison in mind, but then thought about Van Damme's performance in JCVD, which is better than Seagal's entire career, and went with Lundgren instead.