Junior
When I first heard that they were making a movie where Arnold Schwarzenegger would play a pregnant man I think my reaction was “what, does the baby come out of his dick??” I’d ask you to cut me a bit of slack as I was 15 years-old at the time. The film in question is called Junior and it marks the second collaboration between Schwarzenegger, Danny DeVito, and the late comedy auteur Ivan Reitman. This sort of flick should’ve been catnip for a cat like me ‘cuz I fuck with Twins HEAVY! Always have…always will. I only have one tattoo and it’s the phrase “tonight it your night, bro” across my lower back (note: this is a lie). But see folks—Junior came out a month after Pulp Fiction (which DeVito produced, strangely enough) and I was exclusively watching films with loads of bloodshed and briefcases full of stolen diamonds and dudes standing around cussing and taking about obscure pop culture-y stuff….and not at all interested in shit like Junior. I mean—look at the goofy ass poster? It looks terrible…and the contemporary reviews seemed to confirm that suspicion. Flash forward to the plague-ridden hellscape that is June of 2022. The Supreme Court overturns Roe v. Wade and it is somehow only the 3rd most horrible story of the news week (I already can’t recall which mass shooting happened that week…but I’m positive there were at least two…if not three). A few days later I overheard my girlfriend talking about a film that “was a groundbreaking study of gender role reversal and something that absolutely could not be made in 2022.” I ask her what movie she’s talking about and to my profound surprise…she says JUNIOR! I tell her that I've never seen it.
Her: “What do you MEAN you’ve never seen it??”
Me: You HAVE seen it??
Her: Many times!!
Me: (long pause)…so…does the baby come out of his dick??
Here I will ask you to cut me no slack as I am a grown ass man and thus way too old for that type of juvenile humor.
So I decided to sit down and watch Junior for the first time…and what happens is this: Arnold Schwarzenegger, fresh off his first ever big budget disaster Last Action Hero, plays Alex Heese (get it?), a scientist who is working in conjunction with Dr Larry Arbogast (DeVito), a slithery obstetrician and, I guess, pharmaceutical engineer to develop a fertility drug called Expectane. Hesse does most of the lab work, injecting drugs into chimps and whatnot. He also has a dream where he’s stuck in a library full of pissing babies…so right away we know: not huge into tykes. Arbogast runs around frantically barking orders at his secretary, who is totally Janice Soprano-Baccalieri, and collecting sperm samples for an extra who is totally Chris Meloni (I’m gonna go fondle my sweaters). He’s also estranged from his wife Angela, (Kindergarten Cop’s Pamela Reed) who is freshly impregnated by Aerosmith (the band). If they didn’t license Dude (Looks Like a Lady) for this movie I will eat my own socks. Talk about a 60 MPH pitch over the middle of the plate! Their project is being bankrolled by Noah Banes (man who was recently outed as a sex creep, Frank Langella). Real quick: Langella got in trouble for getting too handsy while shooting a sex scene for an upcoming Netfilx limited series. Not so sound ageist but…erm…he’s fucking 84 years old! Gah! Hesse and Arbogast attempt to get their drug approved by the FDA, who are all like “sorry, we aren’t into drugs that help people…HARD PASS!” Hesse is heartbroken and Arbogast is out $300k. Before Hesse can pack up his lab, he runs into the inexplicably clumsy new incoming scientist Dr Diana Reddin, (Dame Emma Thompson, who was nominated for Best Actress for her performances in TWO different movies in the year before she made Junior! I wonder what she’s most proud of–Howard’s End or Junior?) She literally smashes into Hesse and knocks that big beast to the ground, straddles him, and plants a kiss on his kisser. Hesse tells her to get up off of him and boards the first plane back to Austria. Arbogast follows him onto the plane to try to convince him not to leave the country. Man, the shit you could do at airports before 9/11! Arbogast sidles up to Hesse and lays out the plot for him: since they can’t feed their drug to a human person without breaking an ass ton of laws, Arbo suggests that Hesse take the drug himself! “That’s what Jenner did with smallpox,” he tells Hesse. As in Caitlyn Jenner?? I seriously failed every science course I ever took in my life and have already failed a few in my next life as well. Hesse reluctantly agrees and we have ourselves a ballgame!
Arbogast steals one of Reddin’s frozen embryo popsicles and brings it to an unaware Hesse. I guess the plan is for Hesse to produce a semen sample (which he does…gingerly. Of COURSE this dude can fill Folgers cans with his load), combine it with the Ill gotten embryo, and chug it down like a shot of Rumplemintz. I have questions…and they are MANY! I don’t even know where to begin! Like…the dude doesn’t have a womb…or an umbilical cord…or any of the necessary lodging to host a fetus. Is the kid just gonna grow in his stomach next to half digested schnitzel and shit?? Is he going to shoot the kid out of his arsehole. Or, you know, out of his DICK!? Wait hold up! I guess he’s only supposed to carry the fetus through the first trimester. Then they’ll flush the kid, present their miraculous findings to the FDA, and get filthy rich. So Hesse is expecting…and the filmmakers are expecting the mere sight of a pregnant Arnold Schwarzenegger will be enough to have people rolling in the goddamn aisles. It’s all pretty predictable and mostly laugh-free. Hesse has morning sickness and tender nipples and he starts to cry at shitty lifetime movies. He also has a dream where he gives birth to a baby with a hideous computer-generated Arnold Schwarzenegger face. That’s some grade-Z special effects right there. They must’ve spent most of this movie’s $60 million budget on Arnold’s customized on-set humidor. Langella is supposed to be the villain but he isn’t particularly villainous. Like…he shuts down their lab…but they can still work there? And draw a paycheck? It’s all super fuzzy. And then there’s Thompson, who just klutzes her way through the movie, crashing into shit left and right like an errant Stooge. My GF thinks this is a role reversal and that Emma Thompson is supposed to represent the male gender because she’s so handsy and clumsy and a shabby dresser. I mean…she probably ain’t wrong.
What else happens? I’m guessing there will be a romance between at least two of these co-stars…and since the movie isn’t THAT progressive…I’m thinking Hesse and Reddin will wind up knocking the boots…and I am correct. They swoon all over each other at a cocktail party that goes on for approximately 90 minutes. Afterwards, we learn that Hesse has successfully completed his first trimester and that they can now sell their drug to the FDA. Arbogast tells Hesse to just stop taking the Expectane and the embryo will be absorbed into his body. Mmm hmm. So he follows his advice and the movie ends. Roll credits! I kid…I kid. Hesse continues taking the drug because of course he does. He has to wear XXXXL sweatshirts to the lab to hide his pregnant belly…and it’s here where I realize that one of the lab techs is the “I don’t fly without my lucky hat” girl from Goodfellas! Now isn’t that something! It only takes about a minute for Arbogast to figure out that Hesse is still preggo because look at the dude. He’s super cheesed off. Tells him if the media finds out then his life will be over. I don’t know…will it? They didn’t have Twitter and shit back in 1994 #omgdudeshavinbabies. Arbogast agrees to help see Hesse to term…cuz he’s a buddy and this here’s a buddy comedy. Hesse makes regular visits to Arbo’s clinic, where the pregnant ladies waiting in the reception area treat him like a peer and comisserste about pregnancy-related issues and somehow don’t point and scream “YO—the Terminator is knocked up!!” Arbogast’s Aero-inseminated ex wife continues to linger around the scene (skee de do ba do ba do da dohhh—Steven Tyler) and starts to suspect Hesse is preggo after watching him crush mad dinner one night. I mean…If I saw a dude chowing face I’d prolly just assume he was hungry and not pregnant…just sayin’. Noah Banes, who has been a fleeting presence for most of this flick, also grows suspicious. He shows up at Arbogast’s house one day all like “you guys aren’t doing anything weird and illegal, like feeding men unsanctioned fertility tonics or anything, are you?” They tell him they are not, no. He’s like “cool, can I snoop around your bathroom then?” and they’re like HAVE AT IT!! Banes hits the upstairs WC and OF COURSE they’ve got vials upon vials of Expectane just laying out on the shitter! Cat’s out of the bag, y’all.
Hesse and clumsy ass Reddin continue to cautiously romance each other. One afternoon after a mild necking sesh, she tells Hesse that she wants children but she’s old and unlovely so she froze one of her own eggs (named Junior…which is also the name of the movie we’re talking about) for later use. Girl, you’re only 34! Janet Jackson had a baby at 65! When Hesse mentions this to Arbogast he's like “you know that’s weird ‘cuz the egg inside you is also named Junior!” Hesse is pregnant with Reddin’s baby!! What in the WORLD!? Hesse is PISSED!!! He tears both of Arbogast’s arms off, throws him from the roof of a building, and screams “see you at the party, Richter!” Not really, though. Hesse comes clean to Reddin, who is understandably apoplectic. Holy shit, right? It’s like…I have some bad news about your egg. And…actually…some even worse news.” Dudes have broken every law in the book and several that haven’t even been created yet! Before they can finish hashing it out, Banes shows up with the authorities screaming “arrest that pregnant man!” Hesse, who is still a fucking mountain of a human, throws Banes to the ground, looks into the camera, and shouts “MY BODY…MY CHOICE!!” The room (my girlfriend…myself…our cats) breaks into applause. Arnold Schwarzenegger…two-time Republican Governor of the state of California…throwing down hard for the pro choice set. Good on him, man. He really became a decent dude later in life, Arnold did.
Arbogast has to secret Hesse away to some Northern California pregnancy retreat run by legendary folk singer Judy Collins just for shits and giggles. He has to dress him up like Mrs Doubtfire first so no one suspects this 6,2” muscle machine with a voice deeper than the Mariana Trench is actually a man. There’s a maternity mission montage set to some schmaltzy Patty Smyth song and the movie uneventfully rolls into its 4th hour. Reddin shows up unannounced and tells Hesse that she's NO LONGER ANGRY! Well that took less than 5 movie minutes! Damn. She’s also ready to fam down with Hesse. You know…have the babe and raise it together? But she says they should immediately have intercourse so she can make sure his merchandise is in good working order. They go back to his room and get naked and it’s so weird and graphic and his baby belly keeps getting in the way of…AHHH I’m just fooling’! This a PG-13 movie.
Arbogast flies to NYC to sell the drug to the Sackler’s and Reddin heads back to her lab so naturally Hesse goes into labor…and his present location lacks facilities for delivering babies from human men. Plans are made to sneak Hesse into the lab for an emergency C-section (Ahhhh HAH!!!!) but someone tips off Banes, who alerts the media. The press corps gather outside of the lab and Banes announces that he’s developed a fertility drug and impregnated a man, who will be arriving post haste. Like…that’s his entire villainous character arc?? He just tries to take credit for Danny Devito’s drug? Weak sauces. When Arbogast shows up before the assembled masses, the person with him in labor is his ex wife and not Hesse! They went ahead and snuck Hesse in the back door! The old back door trick!!! Everyone is all “boo, Frank Langella, boo! You SUCK!” He is never seen again. Hesse is brought to the delivery room and the ex wife is brought to some shitty reception area to squeeze it out. Both children are delivered without incident and no babies are ejaculated from male penises. It’s a climax that doesn’t climax. Although the ex-wife's kid has Steven Tyler lips and starts to scat “ah ka ka ka ka ka KOW!” instead of crying (note: it was revealed earlier that ex was impregnated by one of Aerosmith’s roadies and not an actual band member…but I’m choosing to ignore that fact for the sake of the joke that I just made).
We flash forward a year or so down the line, where we find the cast and their newish offspring lounging on a tropical island enjoying their newfound pharma wealth. Hesse has impregnated Reddin with his potent Conan the Barbarian seed. You know, the regular way. Arbogast has decided to be a good sport and raise his no-longer-ex’s bastard backstage baby. Someone suggests that perhaps Arbogast should be the one to carry Angela’s next baby. Guffaws all around. The movie ends. And listen…I know they’re supposed to shoot a Twins sequel soon…and I’m all for that…but a Junior sequel with a crazy ass 80 year-old pregnant Danny DeVito?? I would see that shit on OPENING DAY!! The end
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