I was nodding at Bilge Ebiri‘s 9.2 “Vulture” piece about Steven Seagal‘s bad guy performance in Machete, which inspired thoughts of a comeback and “hey, he almost seems cool again.” I was thinking the same thing too, except I got hung up on Seagal’s hair. The guy’s 58 years oid and he’s dying it inky black, and he seems to have at least 50% more hair today than he did in the late ’80s.

I’m not saying Segal has to pull the hair plugs out, but if you don’t let a little bit of your age in when you get older you look like a putz. Smart guys tell their hairdressers to let the natural gray grow in around the temples and sideburns. And they don’t color their hair the same shade of black that Elvis Presley started going for in 1957. They let it get a little bit lighter. The basic idea is not to look like you’re dying your hair, or that you’ve got plugs that are denser than a piece of rubber off a Michelin steel-belted radial. And why do older guys’ fake hairlines get lower as they get older? They should recede a bit, no? For realism’s sake, I mean.

Set stills are one thing, but Seagal’s hair looks like a solid helmet in the film, all colored and gunked down with hairspray.