Steven Seagal style?

[Adamantis]

First, let me just state I don´t want to start a Seagal debate here - obviously people have very mixed feelings about the guy.

I just wonder about his style you see in the movies and various youtube videos. I know he´s an aikido master, but there´s lots of strikes and kicks in his movies. Some of his strikes just look like slaps, and he keeps doing these distinctive motions where his arms would cross, i have no idea? Since there are practically no strikes/kicks in aikido, I just wonder where he got it from. Are there for instance any karate styles that looks like that? Or did he just make it up himself?

As an example (although maybe not a good one), here:

[cheesefrysamurai]

from what I know Steven Segal is the real deal in Aikido.

The rest of that stuff is probably choregraphed to look good

[Adamantis]

Yes, I think he´s a 7. dan.

I´ve heard he started his career with karate, but I´m not sure if there´s anything specific in his movies. I don't know if the sparring in the video is real effective stuff but it looks like he has fast hands and is good at finding openings, I wonder where he picked that up? Given that nothing in the video has anything to do with aikido...

[sensei8]

Practically doesn't mean none; therefore, Aikido does have kicks/strikes, just enough to be effective in set-ups and the like. It's possible that Segal has done some extensive cross training with other styles of the MA, and in that, it's possible he's learnt other things while being in Law Enforcement.

[Adamantis]

Strikes - we have atemi to create openings, but they are very basic , straight forward punching.

Kicks - very very very rare...

He has definitely trained in other arts, so I was wondering from which he picked up his sparring style. I have very little knowledge about karate, so I was wondering if maybe some particular style bears any resemblance, as I know he started off with karate?

To be honest, I think it looks pretty cool,

[bassaiguy]

Ueshiba once said, "Ninety percent of Aikido is atemi." Maybe he's just showing the strikes that most aikidoka leave out of their practice in order to work on waza.

[Adamantis]

That´s a clever answer. Sadly we´ve practiced way too little atemi in our class, but from what I´ve seen in more advanced aikido videos, it looks the same as what Seagal does. And it would make sense since Seagal´s main style is aikido.

I should really look more into atemi, I think it´s very relevant, and the main reason I started doing karate was that we very rarely practice strikes/atemi in our dojo.

Thanks.

[ps1]

Yes, he's extremely talented at Aikido. A lot of his other stuff is choreographed for movies. He did study Shotokan for a short time, but I've never seen anything stating his rank, suggesting it may have been below black belt.

Also, I couldn't help but post this video. It makes me laugh:

[Adamantis]

I´ve heard he holds several black belts, karate one of them, but who knows... at least it says everywhere that he started training under a karate master.

The striking stuff in his movies looks the same as aikido atemi, and I recognize a lot of the throws/locks.

Wouldn´t it be awesome if there were more running scenes in his newest movies?

[JohnASE]

I had a vague memory of Fumio Demura mentioning during a conversation that Steven Seagal trained with him for a little while as a teenager. Results from a quick internet search seems to support this. I didn't bother following any links to see how long he trained, so I have no idea how much of Seagal's striking could have come from those days.