Ahhhh, supporting actor... what other phrase evokes such images of... well, support? This is kind of the category for the bad guy or the buddy or the lackey. It’s been all of these things over its existence, and this year it’s not all that different. There’s the old sage, the burned out con, the gay buddy, the father figure, and, well, the teacher from Dead Poet’s Society. But which one of these arguably great actors has done enough bad movie work to truly deserve the little bald gold guy this year? Hmmmm....

First up, and these are in no order except importance determined by a hamster race held earlier today, is Robert Forster. Who? Robert Forster. You know. The guy from The Black Hole? Oh, yeah... This guy’s done a lot of bad movie work. Now I keep hearing he was quite the actor in his day (I think it was a Tuesday), but I’m not so sure. Avalanche? Alligator? Delta Force? And those are just the movies I’ve seen with him. He was also apparently in American Yakuza (a touching portrait about some guy kicking another’s ass) and Body Chemistry 3: Point of Seduction, which I hear was once played on Cinemax for 78 hours straight in 1994. [Ed.: I can confirm this] To me, Robert Forster seems to have the category pretty locked up. Let’s check out the rest of the chumps...

Anthony Hopkins. Is there a more respected actor out there? Let me qualify that a bit: Is there a more respected actor out there who starred in Freejack? (I’m not sure, Mick Jagger was pretty good in that...) Hopkins is one of those actors that it’s hard to peg down which movies he’s done that can be considered truly bad. I mean, we can all agree on something like Freejack, but then there’s stuff like Bram Stoker’s Dracula. I would argue that this certainly qualifies as a bad, bad film (except for the part with the nympho bedchamber vampires, yowza!), but others, I am sure, would disagree. To these people, I ask, which was funnier, Bram Stoker’s Dracula or Dracula: Dead and Loving It? [Ed.: Show a little respect for Love at First Bite! George Hamilton's radioactive skin is eating him alive, man!] If you answered the former, you’re not only right, you’ve made my point. Anyway, it’s clear Hopkins doesn’t have the bad movie chops to compete with legends like Robert Forster. Moving on, then...

A lot of people have gotten there panties in a bunch over the fact that Greg Kinnear (a straight man) was nominated for playing a gay guy while Rupert Everett (a gay man) was not nominated for playing a much funnier gay guy. Now, we here at Oh, the Humanity! don’t get involved in such squabbles. No, we rise above the fray and look beyond such silly designations, looking only at how crappy a performer has looked in earlier work. Thank you. (This message was brought to you by the ACLU) In that sense, Greg Kinnear has a huge advantage over Everett. He was, after all, in A Smile Like Yours and Sabrina, which may have not been a "bad" movie technically, but was most certainly a BAD movie. Forgetting all that, he was the host of Talk Soup, for God’s sake! Being on a really crappy cable show (which, I happen to really like) makes up for pretty much making the best freakin’ movie ever. Therefore, he clearly moves ahead of Anthony Hopkins and puts the heat on Forster. [Ed.: I'm not sure Forster's going to be to happy with a gay guy "putting the heat" on him]

Robin Williams has been nominated before but never won. That counts a lot towards his odds. What counts a hell of a lot more in our poll, however, is a little thing I like to call Popeye. Yup, Robert Altman’s 1980 masterpiece killed more small children then Jack-In-The-Box, and its lingering effects can still be felt to this day. I dare you to try popping Popeye into your VCR (now there’s an image) and then going to see something like, say, Awakenings, while trying to keep a straight face. It ain’t possible kiddies, it just ain’t. [Ed.: Mmmm… Popeyes] As if Popeye wasn’t bad enough, there’s even the fact he made Toys. No, wait, there’s even the fact that Toys was ever made. That should send him to bad movie purgatory for sure. Hmm, apparently he was also in Nine Months. This is becoming a theme. So Robin Williams is a pretty strong candidate.

Rob’s Pick: This is a really strong category. In true contention we’ve got The Guy From The Black Hole, The Guy From Talk Soup, Popeye the Truly Crappy Sailor Type, and, what’s this?! Who’s that guy hiding in the corner? Why, it’s the fifth nominee, no other than the Bandit himself, Burt Reynolds! Let’s give him a hand folks! Burt Reynolds is clearly the man to beat here. He has not only Smokey and the Bandit and Smokey and the Bandit II, [Ed.: Alas! The shortsighted producers who stopped at 2!] but also the entirety of the Cannonball Run Saga. As if that weren’t enough, we’ve got Gator, Shark!, and Cop and a Half. This guy’s the king, baby! And we shall all hail to the king...