IT’S THE BOOZE TALKIN’: Arnold! Make it a comeback, NOT a sell-out!

Last Updated on July 23, 2021

The day Arnold Schwarzenegger won the election and became governor of California was bittersweet for me: I lived there at the time and even voted for the guy (who wouldn’t want the f*cking Terminator as their governor???), but it meant a hold on seeing my favorite action hero on the big screen for awhile. For a long while, as it turns out, with his last original (non-sequel) feature film hitting theaters a full decade ago in 2001 (COLLATERAL DAMAGE), a venture that (sadly) was not one of his best efforts. But now that his stint as governor is over and he’s officially Tweeted his return to making movies once again, the big question is… what will he choose for his big return? And some of the rumors that are floating out there are quite scary. And once I read that he’s looking at remaking PREDATOR and THE RUNNING MAN, I got to drinking (heavily) and then I got to thinking about how Arnold should make his comeback epic and noteworthy.

First, he shouldn’t even think about remaking anything. Period. If people want to remake the shit he rocked in the ‘80s/’90s because they’re too slow, stupid, and uninspired to do anything new, cool, or original, then that’s their bad—Arnold need not sloop down to that level. Remaking THE RUNNING MAN? Seriously? What the f*ck? I have to believe that shit is straight out of the rumor mill, some jerkweed at a computer in bumf*ck Idaho just thought it’d be funny to say and some other a-hole picked it up and ran with it. The idea of something that stupid as Arnold’s big return is f*cking ridiculous. And remaking PREDATOR? I guess whoever made that one up forgot they already attempted to do that with PREDATORS and it (more or less) failed. So right off the bat, those are scratched.

For a real come-back, Arnold has to act his age. He’s not the superstar he was when TOTAL RECALL came out or even as good as shape as he was when TERMINATOR 3 came out. He’s old, he’s aged, he’s been pushing too many pencils for the last few years as a f*cking politician. So what does that mean for him? It means he has to pick a role that still makes him out to be a badass, but one that acknowledges his age. He needs to take some notes from Clint f*cking Eastwood or Liam f*cking Neeson and pick a role that says ‘Hey, I’m old, but all that means is that I don’t really give a f*ck and I can still be a hardass and surprise the shit out of you!’ A flick like that with the attitude to boot won’t require Arnold to be a celebrated actor or even require the best performance of his career. He just needs to be old and badass, and frankly, Arnold already is both of those things.

One flick he was eyeing before his semi-retirement from the biz was a little World War II flick called WITH WINGS AS EAGLES, about a Nazi general looking for redemption in wartime Germany. For a big bad Austrian, the role is a no-brainer (in terms of casting), but does anybody really want to watch a WWII movie? Unless Quentin Tarantino is involved and the end result is Hitler being blown away to smitherings, I’m gonna go ahead and say NO, people don’t really want to see another f*cking WWII movie. Sure, Arnold would likely have the opportunity to act his balls off, but let’s remember, the guy’s been out of the acting realm for the last decade, he should ease his way back in the acting saddle and not take something as heavy as a WWII movie right off the bat. Save it for the second film after his return once he has his mojo back.

So where does that leave us? The obvious choice, of course: THE EXPENDABLES 2! Say what you will about THE EXPENDABLES, the flick was a true and blue action flick and made each and every one of the aging stars relevant and f*cking badass again—so why the f*ck not have Arnold reprise his role as Stallone’s competition, make him the bad guy (or maybe just a bigger rival than before), and have the two go head to head in a blaze of glory. You can’t deny THE EXPENDABLES sparked new life into Stallone’s career, and if Arnold comes back equally as badass, it really would be a come-back of epic proportions. Plus, haven’t we waited long enough to see Arnold and Sly beat the shit out of each other on the big screen? Debbie Gibson and Tiffany finally did it with glorious results, now it’s time for the big dogs to do it!

Maybe it’s the booze talkin’, but Arnold needs to make his return to film a serious comeback, and not a f*cking sell-out, as the rumors of remakes would suggest. He needs to embrace his age and realize that this isn’t the ’80s or the ’90s anymore–while our culture is still centered around youth, movies have also accepted the aging ass-kicker as the modern-day action hero. Just look at THE EXPENDABLES, RAMBO, GRAN TORINO, TAKEN, and UNKNOWN for easy examples where the older protagonist kicked mass amounts of ass, and where the audience loved every second of it. The idea of Arnold doing a remake of one of his own movies makes wanna throw up in a blender –and if it were to happen, he would lose one of his biggest lifetime fans. Bring on THE EXPENDABLES 2, baby!