Tremors is a well-loved 90’s movie about giant worms and gay love. Fight me.
Valentine McKee is in love with Earl Bassett. Earl is in love with Val. Neither of them want to admit it.
It’s understandable. There are plenty of other issues going on in their lives that draw their attention in a more immediate way. They want to leave the dead-end town of Perfection, Nevada for nearby Bixby. They want better-paying jobs. They want respect. They want new lives (together, of course). They also want to escape the sudden infestation of gargantuan, subterranean worms trying to consume everyone in town.
Most of us remember Tremors as an early 90s take on the movie monster genre that turned out far better than it had a right to be. Here, instead of giant ants or rabbits, it’s worms. These desert worms, eventually named “graboids” by the town's residents, are out for blood. Growing up to 30 feet and clocking in at a minimum of 10 tons, these behemoths use a truly creepy set of jaws and prehensile, toothed tongues to “grab” onto their hapless prey.
So, it’s pretty cut and dry, right? Worms invade town. Our central characters defeat them, build relationships, share some funny moments. It’s a smart, fun creature feature with good practical effects and cult status.
Well, unless you’re spending a lot of time at home recently, thanks to various life changes and a worldwide pandemic. Then, you’ve got the space to start really gathering evidence about a pet theory. Let’s say it’s a theory that’s been haunting you for years, ever since you made a dumb joke while watching the movie on an otherwise unremarkable night.
Tremors is a fun monster movie that also happens to feature a gay couple.
Listen, I know Tremors was not meant to be a secret gay film. But, death of the author being what it is, I’m determined to give this early 90s genre classic my own read. Stick with me. Maybe, by the end, you'll agree, too.
The thesis here is that Earl and Val, the two point of view characters, are no less than an old married couple. They live together - check out that shared nameplate on their shabby trailer - and indeed plan to move to the big city of Bixby together. It's a given, apparently. Never is there any talk that they will split up in search of their own fortunes. The pair consistently bicker in a gentle way, based on an underlying familiarity and desire for each to have their best lives. They sleep beneath the stars, together in the back of their shared pickup truck.
They can’t be out, of course. The pair live in rural Nevada, in an era where violence against queer folks was (and often still is) a given. Maybe they can’t even admit it to themselves. Internalized homophobia and fear of pain and violence is a pretty strong deterrent. It is easier sometimes to pretend that you are someone else, than to confront the reality of who you must be.
Tremors tries to work towards plausible deniability. Early on in the film, we meet Rhonda LeBeck, a geology graduate student conducting seismology tests in the area. She also gives Valentine an opportunity to perform some heterosexuality. Earl mentions that there’s a new, young student in town. Val waxes poetic on blondes, while Earl recounts each failed relationship and broken nail suffered by Val’s past conquests.
No matter - Rhonda is a brunette. Well, Earl, clearly I’m not interested in her because she’s not blonde, you see. And the other ones? They broke nails! They whined about the desert heat! They were soft and curvy and entirely too... well. You know, Earl. They just weren’t right for me. That’s all.
Rhonda’s a beard. That is, she's an opposite sex character introduced to make it seem as if our main character is entirely straight. See, says Val, I’ve been making eyes at a real, live lady! No need to look into my close friendship with Earl. Nothing to see there, I assure you.
I don’t mean this as a knock against Rhonda. She’s obviously smart and resourceful. Everyone pays respect to her knowledge and asks for her advice, even though she’s a geology grad student and not a worm expert.
Yet, the movie occasionally positions her as a damsel in distress, all so Val can jump in and pull her away from a graboid. Apart from the scene where she loses her pants (I can’t decide if that’s funny or not, but then why does it always seem to be a woman? Let’s see a young Kevin Bacon pantsless, huh?), Rhonda’s character arc isn’t too bad.
The only real problem, as I see it, is how my argument hand waves the matter of male friendship or bisexuality. Men can have close relationships with one another without immediately being gay. There are plenty of ways to love one another. The fear of being gay, for some, damages what could be close friendships. Taken the wrong way, the “Val and Earl are gay” argument supports this harmful stereotype. That’s not at all what I want to do. Neither do I want to erase bisexual men from the narrative.
At the same time, I very selfishly want to believe that people could be gay as all hell and still seen as integral parts of their community. I want queer folks to be brave and silly and stupid and turn graboids into huge chunks of mushy pumpkin. I want them to be out and proud in a rural town and not be afraid.
Tremors, taken this way, is affirming. Yes, it takes quite a lot of reshaping of the original material. But, just imagine!
Even within the world of the canon plot, Val and Earl aren’t really losers. Everyone else recognizes the duo as competent allies. Without Earl and Val around, who would fix their fences? Who could buckle down and empty their nasty waste tanks? Who would bother to check in on vulnerable members of their community, even when one of them is an old drunk who’s climbed up to the top of a transmission tower? Both risk their lives to save others in the town, over and over.
Val and Earl emerge as bumbling but honorable heroes. They don’t grandstand or puff their chests. They listen to Rhonda’s expertise, accept Heather and Burt’s terrifying firepower, and collaborate with everyone on a plan to get out of town and defeat the graboids once and for all. It's community action at its best, and all spearheaded by Val and Earl.
It's important to dream of a world where a romantically-inclined Earl and Val are accepted and even embraced as part of country life. The reality is all too often the opposite. Whispering, ostracization, physical violence, a long, aching list of all the ways a community tries to extricate someone deemed unfit.
When you grow up in a place where “gay” and “queer” are naughty words at best (and a mortal sin at worst), you start to wonder if queer people are unicorns. Do they really exist? Or, are they like shadows at the edge of your vision, here and gone, so fast that you can’t be sure you’ve seen them? As a kid, I logically understood that gay people were real, but damned if I knew one for sure.
And what about the lingering thought, the one waiting at the bottom of your mental well: that you may be one of them after all? Then you’ll have to go live somewhere else. A fabled city of gay cryptids, a Bixby full of Bigfoots and Moth people and Graboids. They don’t discriminate, at least. All they want to do is eat you. It could be worse.
At the end of the movie, the worms are gone, and Val and Earl are about to leave town - for real, this time, one hopes. The graboids are gone. Most of the people in town have survived. What more do they need to do? Everyone can just pump their own sump tanks, right? Val has a supremely awkward interaction where he and Rhonda sort of mumble and stare at one another, each expecting the other to make a move. Earl gives him a look. What kind of look? Exasperation? “Get it out of your system already,” maybe. Resignation? Is it too much to read a note of despair on his face?
“What’s a woman like her want with a guy like me?” Val asks. He kisses Rhonda anyway, and we watch the credit rolls while they continue to merge at the face.
After the screen fades to black, I always imagine Val pulling away, shrugging. “Sorry, had to make sure,” he says. “You’re a nice lady, and real smart.” Then he goes back to the waiting Earl and they drive away to another life. Or, hell, maybe they get that feature in National Geographic after all, then return to a town that didn’t seem to hurt them anyway. It’s wishful thinking.
Listen, you don’t have to go along with my theory. You could accept what the movie says and never engage with a work of art beyond its established parameters.
Or, you could imagine a different world. Think of a place where everyone teams up against an outside threat and no one really cares about your romantic inclinations. Instead of queer folks fleeing dangerous, unwelcoming rural communities, see a different place. It’s not a utopia - thanks to graboids and grinding poverty - but it’s not so bad. You’ve got your trailer, your truck, your work, the wide open air. You’ve got your man.
Together, you’ll survive just fine.
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