On December 21, an unsung masterpiece of queer cinema turned 30, and I’ll be damned if I let that go unnoticed. Yes, the 90s sublime comedy-horror-romance, Tammy and the T-Rex, is now thirty, flirty, and thriving.
Tammy and the T-Rex might have the best plot synopsis of all time. High school himbo jock Michael (Paul Walker) is kidnapped by his girlfriend’s (Denise Richards) evil ex-boyfriend and fed to a pack of hungry lions in a nearby big cat sanctuary. Meanwhile, a mad scientist (Terry Kiser) is in search of a human brain to power his newest invention, a giant robotic T-Rex. Luckily, Michael’s freshly mauled corpse has just arrived in the town morgue and his brain is in remarkably usable condition. Understandably, Michael’s consciousness isn’t exactly thrilled to wake up inside the body of a mechanical dinosaur and he sets out on a bloody quest for vengeance. It’s up to Tammy and her gay best friend Byron (Theo Forsett) to find a way to get Michael back to normal before his new saurian body is destroyed or falls into the wrong hands.
If you aren’t sold after reading that synopsis, I don’t know what to tell you. Hopefully, you’re like me and are a gay Dinosaur Nerd™ with a soft spot for schlocky direct-to-VHS 90s cinema, in which case I’m delighted to tell you Tammy and the T-Rex can be watched in all its gory glory on Shudder, which proudly includes it on its list of queer horror films. And while it may earn its place on that list for featuring a gay character in a supporting role, I’d argue that Tammy and the T-Rex is an intrinsically queer film that asks, no, demands deeper analysis.
According to his own account, director Stewart Raffill (who is maybe best known for directing the infamous ET knockoff Mac and Me) wrote, directed, and produced the film in the span of two weeks to take advantage of the lifesize animatronic dinosaur used to create the titular tyrannosaurus before it was shipped out of the country. Given the film’s rushed production, it’s honestly impressive just how coherent of a film Tammy and the T-Rex is, which isn’t to say that it isn’t weird (and gay) as hell. The plot has a clear three act structure, but its breakneck twists and turns require that you question little and accept the unexpected. (Don’t ask why our villainous mad scientist wants to put Paul Walker’s brain inside a robot dinosaur, for example. You won’t get an answer.)
Tonally, Tammy and the T-Rex can’t decide if it’s a raunchy teen romcom or a hyper gory robot-dinosaur exploitation movie, but it somehow manages to do both, often at the same time. The costuming is also filled with all kinds of flashy, high camp looks. I’m particularly a fan of the floral bucket hat Tammy wears to go visit her recently deceased boyfriend in the hospital and the leopard print leotard Helga, the mad scientist’s main henchwoman, spends much of the final act in. Tammy and the T-Rex is the kind of flashy, bizarre film that practically demands a Heathers-style staged musical adaptation, and we haven’t even really talked about the queer stuff yet.
For functionally filling the role of Gay Best Friend in a low budget 90s film, Byron comes across as a surprisingly multidimensional character who is given a large amount of agency and focus in the story. Sure, the fact that he’s gay is loudly announced pretty much the second he walks onto screen, but Tammy and the T-Rex never treats Byron’s sexuality as the butt of the joke. There are plenty of moments where Byron playfully flirts with men or speaks in homoerotic innuendo, but Raffill, for all his many faults, never frames Byron himself as the joke. Our hero Michael, before and after his transformation into a mechanical prehistoric beast, treats Byron with a comfortable affection and even goes out of his way to ensure his safety. He even gets his own moments of heroism, particularly in the too long car chase that makes up the film’s climax. Maybe my bar is very low, but Byron’s characterization feels surprisingly progressive and normalized for a film of this sort.
While a surface-level queer reading of Tammy and the T-Rex may stop here, I’d argue there is a lot more bubbling beneath. For me, Tammy and the T-Rex feels inescapably like a film about gender, dysphoria, and a relationship struggling to find a path forward amid massive, unforeseen changes. Prior to his nonconsensual brain transplant, Michael is a well liked player on his high school football team, but he doesn’t really fit into the archetypical mold we typically see for these sorts of characters. He’s soft-spoken, kind, and wears so many crop tops that you’d think you were watching Sleepaway Camp. Michael is also almost immediately put into contrast against Tammy’s abusive ex, Billy, who dresses in black leather outfits, shouts every other line, and is prone to physical violence. For most of the time we know Michael in human form, he’s hounded by Billy and his gang of friends, which ultimately culminates in his murder-via-lion. If Michael is meant to represent a different kind of masculinity, it’s one very quickly threatened with violence and the fact that Tammy would choose this over Billy’s stereotypical badboy behavior unbalances high school gender norms.
And then of course, post-lion-mauling, Michael wakes up in the body of a mechanical tyrannosaurus. While Michael-Rex is suitably pissed and does take out his violent revenge on both his murderers and those responsible for his transformation, he spends just as much time forlornly looking at himself in the mirror or gazing sadly at his tiny new arms. A lesser film would’ve had Michael transform into a mindless killing machine, but Tammy and the T-Rex wants us to remember there is a good person inside this robot, frequently reminding us of the discomfort and sadness that comes with his sudden change. Raffill even has Michael’s revenge spree occur relatively early on into the film’s second act, leaving his dinos-phoria as the primary conflict as we move into the film’s climax and conclusion.
Once Michael manages to convince Tammy and Byron that it is in fact him inside the dinosaur that’s been tearing through the SoCal suburbs, our trio of protagonists rush into action to change him back. However, it becomes clear that Michael’s body is, well, not really in the position to accept new brains. There’s no way for Michael to return to his old self. So, in my personal favorite sequence in the movie, Tammy and Byron break into the local morgue and one-by-one present Michael-Rex with various new potential bodies to inhabit. While both Tammy and Byron have their own opinions on what form would be best for Michael, they agree it’s ultimately up to him to decide what his new body will be. Michael turns down every male body he’s presented with but spends the most time deliberating on the only woman he’s shown. While Tammy makes it clear this wouldn’t be her preference, Byron encourages her and Michael, noting they “could be like three sisters.” Michael does eventually turn down the woman’s body, but the question remains open, particularly because the arrival of the local police forces the trio to abandon their body-snatching quest before a solution is found.
It’s hard to read thematic intentionality into much of any of the story choices in Tammy and the T-Rex, but the fact that Michael is even open to the possibility of changing sex feels significant. I won’t spoil the absolutely bonkers conclusion to this film, but I will say that the question of Michael’s body and even identity is given a far from clear-cut answer. A trans reading of Michael and for the film is far from a reach and, if anything, feels like a missing subtext that helps tie much of the movie’s chaos together. (If we do ever get that stage adaptation, I’d argue for just making this full-on text — if not for the thematic weight of it all, then for the sheer amount of trans and testosterone related puns you could write from “T-Rex.”)
To me, the most endearing aspect of this storyline and the movie as a whole is the loyal and playful love affair Tammy and Michael maintain throughout the film. The two display an uncomplicated affection for one another that transcends form. I can’t help but be won over by the weird couple in-joke the two share that Michael has a habit of biting the heads off flowers. Tammy is just as in love with a T-Rex as she is with a boy, and while Tammy makes it clear she’d rather Michael not become a girl, she doesn’t fully discourage him from this option either. She quite clearly loves Michael for Michael, and who’s to say if that might not carry over should he decide to transition genders instead of species? Even still, if Tammy isn’t able to find a romantic or sexual future for the two of them post-transition, she loves Michael enough to support him and let him make his own decisions. Yes, I’m projecting here, but not by much!
So please, do consider giving this off-kilter, headscratcher of a film a watch this week. Celebrate its 30th in style and appreciate it for the unexpectedly affirming trans romance that it is. Or, just smoke a joint and tune in to watch Denise Richards in a red dress ride around on a robot dinosaur that bites the heads off people. That’s a good enough reason, too.
