TRANSlating That Time Arnold Schwarzenegger Showed What Happens When Men Can Get Pregnant
Arnold Schwarzenegger, Pregnant Men, And Mr. Sulu’s Fight For Equal Rights
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Y’all remember Arnold Schwarzenegger?
Just three years after he stunned audiences with the blockbuster Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991), Arnold returned to subvert just about every idea about gender we had.
This time, Schwarzenegger wouldn’t return as an unstoppable killing machine. Nor would he take the screen as the last action hero.
Old hat. Too easy.
This time, Arnold Schwarzenegger would get pregnant.
It Is A Truth Universally Acknowledged That A Trans Mom Wants More Stories About Trans Pregnancies
A research scientist becomes the world’s first pregnant man in order to test a drug he and a colleague have designed for expectant women. To carry out the trial, he has an embryo implant, believing that he will only carry the baby for three months — hardly expecting to face the prospect of giving birth. — Wikipedia description
We’ve come a hell of a long way since 1994.
We will continue to get bold new stories that speak to what trans, intersex, non-binary, and gender non-conforming people experience specifically with pregnancy.
And what bold stories those will be with actual queer people playing the roles. But while those movies are in production…
I can’t help but keep going back to old stories. Movies like Junior where with a slight shift in the premise, the story can expand the audience’s imagination to embrace a man as iconic as Arnold Schwarzenegger also being able to get pregnant.
Why Arnold Schwarzenegger was perfect to play a pregnant man
As an actor with big muscles and a balky Austrian accent, you’d think [Arnold] would be limited, and yet he knows himself so well that it gives him freedom: Is a pregnant Arnold any harder to believe, really, than Arnold as Conan the Barbarian? — Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun Times, Review of “Junior”
Arnold Schwarzenegger made a career out of leaning into any role that subverted our perception of him as an indestructible Terminator. He always showed up as himself — an Austrian of culture and intellect with impeccable pecs — but subverted new aspects of his masculinity as often as he subverted someone else’s.
From what Arnie revealed in the 1977 documentary Pumping Iron, I’m honestly still shaking my head at all of the things Schwarzenegger implied he did to sabotage his competitors the night before they competed for Mr. Olympia.
In the documentary, Arnold says:
“Franco is pretty smart, but Franco’s a child, and when it comes to the day of the contest, I am his father. He comes to me for advices. So it’s not that hard for me to give him the wrong advices.”
People rightly expected Lou Ferrigno — the original Incredible Hulk — to unseat Conan the Barbarian.
Lou placed third.
Arnold, of course, won.
Again.
In Twins (1988), he was in better shape than ever. But in that movie, as Danny DeVito’s slightly better-looking twin brother, he came from an isolated island where he’d never met a woman. Arnold is the last person the audience expected to blush at the thought of kissing a girl, but he couldn’t even bring himself to make the first move.
With great power comes great pecs
Then came Junior in 1994.
It’s his seeming utter confidence in his masculinity throughout any subversion of that masculinity that gives Arnold Schwarzenegger’s performances such power — and made him perfect to play a cisgender man terminating every prejudice anyone might have against other men getting pregnant.
During his golden years for the Chicago Sun Times, legendary film critic Roger Ebert wrote about Junior, saying:
“I know this sounds odd, but Schwarzenegger is perfect for the role. Observe his acting carefully in “Junior,” and you’ll see skills that many “serious” actors could only envy. He never reaches for an effect. He never grabs for a joke. He never wrings an emotion out of reluctant material. He plays the role absolutely straight, trusting the material to make the points and get the laughs. This is probably the only way this story could have worked, but not every actor would have known that.”
It’s an impressive movie, even if it’s not…quite…good.
One scene in particular from Junior pits Arnold against a source of bigotry worse than Skynet.
You think facing a squad of Terminators is scary? Try facing a squad of Karens.
This incredibly offensive scene; or Why I Keep Coming Back To Junior
A few years ago, a non-binary publishing friend told me how much they wanted a kid.
They didn’t want to adopt. They didn’t want to — just as Chighur ribbed the gas station attendant before flipping a coin — “marry into it.” They wanted to get pregnant. The problem? They were afraid to face the judgement of people — including themselves — for doing something that felt for them almost inescapably tied to being female.
But my friend isn’t a woman. They are a non-binary person. And at the time, they still had the organs that would allow them to get pregnant.
It’s strange the things that make me feel jealous.
In the below scene, Arnold is settling into pregnancy. He finds himself consumed with all of the instinctive love for that unborn child that Danny DeVito told him he’d feel.
After watching Terminator 2 a few times, Arnold should have known that if a robot can learn to cry, so can an Austrian research geneticist when he’s suddenly confronted by the specific bigotry that pregnant people face when someone identifies them (including mistakenly) as something other than cisgender.
Roger Ebert summarized the scene:
When the director of an expectant moms’ center (Judy Collins) finds it odd that her newest client is a muscle-bound 6-footer, Arnold haltingly reveals that he is an East German athlete, victimized by illegal hormone treatments.
Can bad movies transition?
There is no way to go back and make this scene into what I want. It would take not just a tweak, but a TRANSformation (heh… heh…).
Since I’m stuck instead trying to find value in as many representative movies from Trans, Intersex, Non-binary, and Gender non-conforming (TING!) film history as possible…
| 5 Free Trans Movies Better Than Anything On Netflix | Trans Men: 7 Documentaries, 2 Movies, 1 Comedy Special, All Free | 10 Extremely Trans Xmas Streaming Selections | Now THAT’S Trans Xmas Music! Volume 1 | 13 More Free Streaming Trans Movies | Two Cool Trans Mini-Series On YouTube Better Than Anything On Netflix | 8 Foreign Films About Trans Women | 17 Incredibly Short Transgender Short Films |
…I find myself reaching for gratitude that while I’m desperate for more stories about trans men that are played by trans men, I appreciate movies like Junior that played an essential role in shifting the public perception of whether it’s okay for men to get pregnant.
Sometimes, all it takes is one privileged hero helping a bigot take that first step to caring about someone who isn’t an extension of themselves.
In defense of Arnold, Roger Ebert said:
“There may be a lot of roles Arnold Schwarzenegger could not play. But there are also roles no one else could play, and they don’t all involve a guy firing missiles at a skyscraper. A lot of actors can hold big machineguns and stand convincingly in front of special effects and explosions. Not many can stand in front of a camera and be nine months pregnant, and actually make us care.”
I don’t think the scene above meant to do this, but through my modern cool trans mom lens, this scene illustrates the bigotry that gender non-conforming pregnant people face the moment they reveal themselves.
The instantaneous need to mask their gender. The almost insurmountable rejection they face from the very people they would have thought were their fiercest allies.
No Movie Is Perfect (But Some Get Better Over Time)
As shown in recent coverage of Joyce Carol GOATs by Jude Ellison S. Doyle, allies are sometimes a work in progress. But if we give them time, they do make progress.
During his years as the Governator, Arnold vetoed legislation that would have helped trans people. He also signed legislation that did help us. The infuriating distinction that tripped him up is the same one that trips up so many well-intentioned conservatives.
Even if they declare themselves queer stans or that they’re frickin’ frackin’ queer themselves, they vote only for legislation that strengthens states rights.
Even if they are queer and/or support the queer community, they fight legislation that would help queer people but might weaken states rights (or strengthen federal power).
Once Arnold was out of power, though, he resumed at least a familiar public journey for progressive politicians and once-conservative actors. How could he resist? He was promoting Terminator 3: War of the Machines.
Maybe that’s not giving him enough credit, but if any part of him held out being a good ally for that movie… Ouch.
The Governator was spurred into change at least in part by a thorough tongue lashing from George Takei.
In a January 2023 interview with Stage, the former Star Trek star said the reason he publicly came out as gay in his late 60s after decades in hiding was because he was “so angry” at the former governor for rejecting a gay marriage bill.
Schwarzenegger rejected a bill to legalize gay marriage that was introduced by Democratic Assemblyman Mark Leno. Schwarzenegger said at the time (via The Independent), “This bill simply adds confusion to a constitutional issue.” He vetoed another bill to legalized same-sex marriage two years later.
“Why did it take me so long to come out?” Takei said. “Because I’m an actor and I wanted to work. I learned at a young age that you couldn’t be an openly gay actor and hope to be employed. And I was already an Asian-American actor, so I was already limited a lot. To this day, there are big Hollywood actors who are not out in order to protect their careers.”
The full interview is here.
If Sulu himself told you to get your ****ing act together…wouldn’t you upgrade your queer politics ASAP?
The queer political legacy of the Terminator: HR-T-800 | TRANS MODEL 101
When Indiana attempted to pass a religious freedom law, Arnold declared, “As an American, I’m incredibly concerned about what happened in Indiana this week and the threat of similar laws being passed in other states. As a Republican, I’m furious.”
He urged voters to “take a quick look at Reddit’s r/news top stories for the week — there have been more than 15,000 comments on this issue, overwhelmingly in opposition to the Indiana law.”
In 2015, Arnold wrote an article for the Washington Post, warning Republicans that their “divisive measures” would cost them the “next generation of voters.”
I know what you’re thinking: “You Californians are eccentric. My state is different. That’s not going to happen here.”
You’re wrong. All you have to do is look at the response to Indiana’s law on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, or pretty much wherever young people congregate and discuss what is important to them.
And as reported by PinkNews, “he famously channelled the Terminator as he hit back at a fan who had a problem with his rainbow-tinted profile picture to celebrate Pride. ‘Hasta la vista,’ he quipped, and the immortal words immediately went viral.”
Terminator: the Trump Chronicles
In recent years his socially-liberal leanings have seen him pitted against Trump, with Schwarzenegger bitterly opposing the [disgraced] homophobe-in-chief throughout his presidency. This culminated in a seething video address on [January 10, 2021] in which the former governor compared the US Capitol riots to the Nazi Kristallnacht.
“President Trump is a failed leader. He will go down in history as the worst president ever. The good thing is he soon will be as irrelevant as an old tweet.”
Final thoughts
There will never be a good argument for limiting the reproductive rights of people based on whether they have had identifiably transgender experiences.
Just like there will probably never be a good argument for watching Junior.
The movie really didn’t do very well when it came out. I guess it hasn’t done very well since then, either.
Here’s your chance to decide for yourself about this genderqueer movie and a Governator that tried to be ahead of their time.
BONUS: Forget Arnold Schwarzenegger! May your journey with HRT be as fruitful as Henry Cavill’s
Note: portions of this article were previous published as “May Your Journey With Gender & Pregnancy Be As Fluid As Arnold Schwarzenegger’s”
About Stephenie Magister
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