“You’re nothing but a chickenshit weasel who thrives on the misery of others. And when death calls, you’ll be screaming like a baby.”

Chuck Norris delivers this incredibly badass line to bad guy Ramon Cota (Billy Drago) near the end of 1990’s “Delta Force 2: The Colombian Connection.” His combination of great quips, big kicks, glistening muscles, huge guns and tight jeans made Norris, who died Thursday at 86, the all-American archetype of the muscled action star. While many of his contemporaries — Stallone, Schwarzenegger, Van Damme and Seagal — seemed larger than life with big accents and hulking frames, Norris felt commissioned by the military to prove what a good, strong man was.

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This character was solidified by Norris’ indelible run of late-’70s and ’80s movies. After his big screen debut getting killed by Bruce Lee in 1972’s “The Way of the Dragon,” the 1978 film “Good Guys Wear Black” was Norris’ first starring action role. This led to a run of films where Norris would play some type of ex-military expert who has to take the law into his own hands, and cemented Norris as the in-house star for........

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