Bruce Willis is one of the all-time great movie stars, a guy who could fill theater seats with a sarcastic one-liner and a charming but grumpy grin. Over the years he starred in all kinds of films, from zany dark comedies like “The Whole Nine Yards” to the Christmas action classic “Die Hard,” but towards the end of his career, it seemed as if he was just putting out as much as he could without paying much attention to quality. It was a move that initially came under fire from fans before Willis’s family announced his retirement in March of 2022 due to a diagnosis of aphasia, a condition that causes progressive cognitive decline. Though there were some questions as to whether Willis wanted to do these films to save up for retirement and help his family or whether he was being taken advantage of, otherwise the movies from this final phase of his career went unnoticed.

Willis’s first credited film role was as the titular Bruno in the 1987 TV movie “The Return of Bruno,” but what was the final film in his filmography? Though he released a slew of direct-to-DVD and streaming movies in 2021 and 2022 (seriously, he was in 19 movies in just those two years alone), Willis starred in two films that released in 2023: Edward Drake’s trilogy ender “Detective Knight: Independence” and Jesse Atlas’s sci-fi thriller “Assassin.”

Originally intended for release in September 2022 under the title “Die Like Lovers,” the film “Assassin” had a limited theatrical release in March of 2023, making it the final film in Bruce Willis’s long and storied career. Directed by Jesse Atlas in his feature debut and written by Aaron Wolfe, based on the duo’s short film “Let Them Die Like Lovers,” “Assassin” follows Willis as Valmora, who leads a group of future soldiers that invent microchip technology that allows them to hop into someone else’s body for missions. It sounds an awful lot like Brandon Cronenberg’s “Possessor” minus the psychedelic imagery and wildly graphic violence, but it takes the concept in a very different direction. When an agent is killed, his wife (“Coming 2 America” actor Nomzamo Mbatha) must take his place in order to get justice. The film also stars Dominic Purcell (“Prison Break”), Andy Allo (“Chicago Fire”), and Mustafa Shakir (“Cowboy Bebop”), though it didn’t get a particularly great critical reception. 

“Assassin” only has a 9% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes, but it’s worth noting that the audience score is much, much higher, sitting at 68% at the time of publishing. Whether that’s people trying to send Willis out on an inflated high note or a matter of real dissonance between critics and audiences, only those who watch “Assassin” will know for certain.