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Netflix; Getty Images; Men's Health Illustration/Jason Speakman // Netflix

8 min read

YAHYA ABDUL-MATEEN II never thought of himself as an action star. The 39-year-old actor has spent lots of time in the ass-kicking space, starring in Michael Bay’s 2022 heart-pounder Ambulance, playing the villain in James Wan’s two Aquaman films, and even taking on two action-adjacent superhero shows in Watchmen and Wonder Man. With the combination of a 6-foot-3 frame and background as an athlete (he was both a basketball player and ran track ) and a brand of can’t-look-away charisma that can’t really be taught, he’s a natural fit to pick up a gun, punch someone in the face, and run across the frame like he’s Tom Cruise.

It’s somewhere he’s already spent a lot of time—and not anywhere he ever expected to be.

“I never really saw myself as an action guy, but now that I’m doing it, I dig it,” he tells…