Harry Callahan is one of the greatest action heroes in the history of movies. Clint Eastwood (despite his difficult personality) is a phenomenal actor, and you have to commend him for taking on more than one legendary role. But I would say that Dirty Harry is my favorite of them all, to be honest.

He is a San Francisco cop who was a maverick in almost every way you can imagine. The first movie, Dirty Harry, has him facing a killer inspired by the real-life Zodiac Killer, and it was my personal favorite in the entire franchise.

The next movie showed him taking on corrupt cops who executed criminals without trial, which is somewhat ironic because that was similar to what Harry himself was often accused of doing.

Then Clint Eastwood smiled when he got Harry to go up against a group of left-wing revolutionaries with the bizarre goal of taking over Alcatraz Island for reasons that were never really clear.

By the fourth movie, he was definitely close to retirement age, but that showdown at the eerie carnival was still pretty exciting.

His final adventure against a killer with multiple personalities was not all that impressive. By then it was certainly time to take away his badge and send him to a nice condo to enjoy retirement. It is amazing that Clint Eastwood has lived this long. He already looked like he was retirement age before I was even born, which is kind of funny.

Harry’s ability to walk the fine line between justice and illegality makes for a fascinating story. Even in times of peace, Harry always had the advantage in intimidation and always managed to sound cool.

And I hope nobody ever decides to remake these movies. They are perfect in their own way and would not translate well into the modern film industry. Nobody could ever capture this role today the way Clint Eastwood did.