If you watch some 60s and 70s shows like Mannix, Rockford files, etc, you'll notice that the muscle/enforcer guys look like they have some meat on them, not like roided out gym rats.

i just watched aliens a few days ago. i had seen it before of course, but i probably hadn't given it a proper watch in ten years at least. it's pretty weird in that basically no one is strikingly beautiful in it. except maybe michael biehn. it's so great that people look normal in it. especially ripley, and not just that she's not beautiful but that she's not put on display. it's so wonderful. but sad that it's not like that anymore.

It's not just that. It's not just "good looking people." It's young looking people.

Leading men used to look like men. They used to cast big, meaty dudes. Tom Selleck was a sex symbol, and he looks like a man. Michael Landon. David Hasselhoff. Mel Gibson.Now Leonardo DiCaprio is in everything, and I know he's 47, but he looks like a 14-year-old or something. Even in all these movies where he plays a scruffy looking person, or somebody his own age, he just looks like a 14-year-old with dirt on his face.

And they do this all the time, with everybody. Christopher Reeve played Superman as a big guy; all the Supermen since him have looked more like gymnasts or something. Henry Cavill is in incredible shape, but somehow when he plays The Witcher he looks like a big meaty dude, but then when he's Superman they try to make him look like a ballet dancer.

I mean sure, there are outlying, unusual characters, like The Rock, but they're the exception. Leading men used to look like if their acting careers didn't take off they could go into lumberjacking.

It feels weird. It always makes me wonder what the goal is.