In 2022, Adam Reed is a 12-year-old, and he is also a 40-year-old.
Yeah, time travel exists. You just don’t know it yet.
You see, in the future, Adam Reed and his wife, Laura, are pilots. In fact, Laura’s the best pilot in the flight program, so when Adam is told that her spaceship broke up on reentry after a mission to 2018, he doesn’t believe it. Instead, from everything he’s gathered, all the facts seem to show that she was murdered.
So, Adam breaks protocol, stealing his government-issued spaceship in order to travel through a wormhole to find out what really happened to her in 2018. Only, the jump from 2050 to 2018 doesn’t go exactly as planned, and he crash-lands in 2022. Quickly losing options and needing a place to hunker down, he turns to the only person he can trust: himself … back when he was 12.
As Big Adam meets with his Young Adam self, he scolds and corrects him on the way he treats his mother, Ellie. Big Adam has lived the life Young Adam’s actions inevitably lead to, and he tries to provide guidance on how to avoid the mistakes he’s made along the way—and sometimes, it’s painful. For instance, after Young Adam makes a mocking comment about Ellie, Big Adam tells him, “You know, 30 years, you still get sick to your stomach every time you remember how you treated her now.”
And the truth is that Young Adam is often sarcastic and mean-spirited, often using his cruel humor as a way to shield the pain he feels over the recent and sudden death of his father, Louis. That’s why it’s especially heart-warming to see Big Adam bump into their mother in a bar and offer her praise and remind her how much her son loves her, telling her that “boys always come back for their mamas” and that he has the best mom.
Big Adam also tells his mother that she should tell Young Adam that she’s grieving over Louis’ death, too, explaining that “the problem with acting like you have it all together is he believes it,” and he needs to know that she doesn’t. It’s a lovely reminder that parents don’t always need to act like everything is OK in order to be a good parent.
But it’s not just their mom that Big Adam needs to reconnect with. Young Adam provides his own wisdom to restore Big Adam’s relationship with the living 2018 version of their father. Over the decades, Big Adam has buried his grief over the loss of their father in a pit of anger. Instead of mourning, he blames Louis for being a bad father, citing examples of how he wasn’t there for them when they needed him. But Young Adam, whose loss is still relatively fresh, corrects Big Adam, showing him how he’s misremembered their memories of their dad. “It’s easier to be angry than to be sad,” he wisely notes.
And this relationship is fleshed out in a beautiful scene that brings tears to the eyes. Big Adam offers to inform his father in 2018 about his impending death, but Louis refuses, saying that Big Adam and Young Adam are his future, and he’s so lucky to have gotten to see it. He then restores his relationship with Big Adam, directly telling him to stop carrying around this pain and that he’s loved him since the moment he was born—“and that will never change.”
Louis makes a reference to fate.
Big Adam and Laura passionately kiss when they find one another, and we hear some moans. Big Adam makes a joke about male genitals.
Young Adam makes a crude joke about going to the therapist’s office to say where the “bad man” touched him. Young Adam asks Big Adam if he will have sex in college.
Louis tells Big Adam that his tight jacket makes him look like a “condom with buttons.” Louis and Ellie share a kiss.
Big Adam is shot at in his spaceship, and we see blood covering his hand from a bullet wound to his side. He shows the wound to Young Adam. Big Adam threatens Ray by pinning him against a wall and explaining the violence he will put Ray through if he hurts Young Adam again.
Young Adam is punched by Ray on multiple occasions, twice causing his nose to bleed. It is mentioned that Young Adam has been suspended three times for fighting. Big Adam tells Young Adam to punch his bully, Ray, in the crotch. Elsewhere, he explains that a woman named Maya Sorian “has the world by the balls” in the future.
Big Adam and Laura fight off a large group of men in black, stormtrooper-like garb, killing many. However, because “dying outside your fixed time is messy,” they evaporate into sparkling mist upon death. Throughout these fights, people are punched, stabbed, electrocuted, shot at and exploded. A random vehicle is destroyed by a missile.
Big Adam makes a joke about drowning his younger self. He also punches Louis, and Louis punches him back, causing the latter to believe he broke his hand. Ellie mentions that Louis died in a car crash. In another, unrelated, moment, Louis slams his car into another.
[Spoiler Warning] Big Adam, Louis and Young Adam fight Big Maya, Young Maya and her henchman, Christos. In the fight against Christos, he beats them all down before being killed by a flying piece of debris. Big Maya accidentally shoots Young Maya, and both of them die as a result. Additionally, Laura is shot and killed by a spaceship.
God’s name is misused nearly 45 times, and a handful of those uses are paired with “d–n.” Jesus’ name is used inappropriately six times. The f-word is used once, and it is mouthed or cut-off on a couple other occasions. We hear about 15 uses of the s-word.
“H—” is used eight times and “a–” more than 15 times. “B–ch,” “d–n,” “p-ss” and “crap” are also used on occasion.
Additionally, “moron,” “idiot” and “turd-burper” are used to insult others. Big Adam says Young Adam has a “very punchable face.”
A bartender pours Ellie a glass of wine, and Big Adam is seen drinking alcohol. Big Adam is seen with a beer, and Young Adam attempts to drink it. Adult Sorian pours Young Sorian what appears to be a glass of alcohol.
Big Adam says his wound makes flatulating noises when he coughs, and he demonstrates this on a couple of occasions. Young Adam is often rude to his mother, and he is rude to her date. After Big Adam threatens Ray, Ray wets himself.
The Adam Project provides yet another story about time travel, but it’s not too focused on time travel itself.
Yes, the characters are focused on fixing the future, but the real story is found in both of the Adams’ relationships with their parents. Ever since the untimely death of his father, Young Adam has been in mourning, and he deals with his pain by taking it out on his mother, who is desperately trying to keep up the façade for her son that everything’s OK.
This contrasts with Big Adam from 32 years in the future, who has come to realize just how much pain he put his mother through when he was Young Adam’s age. However, he’s long past mourning for his father. Instead, Big Adam is angry with him for how much time he spent away from home working on a magnetic particle accelerator called The Adam Project.
Through their mission to change time, Young Adam and Big Adam learn from each other. Though both are technically the same person, their individual experiences and memories help to fix the flaws in one another. And that’s where the movie is at its best, providing tear-jerking moments of redemption and reconciliation in between the intense fight scenes and quick one-liners.
The Adam Project stars Ryan Reynolds and is made by the same director, Shawn Levy, who made 2021’s Free Guy. Those who’ve seen that movie will likely notice the parallels in style between the two films—a combination of somber relationships and heartfelt conversations mixed with the typical humor Reynolds brings to the screen. And where Free Guy was a bit more humor than emotion, The Adam Project ends up being more emotion than humor. And that’s not a bad thing, as much of the emotional story in The Adam Project is based in growing into better people and resolving broken relationships.
But just as in Free Guy, that doesn’t mean The Adam Project is free from content concerns. Parents will want to know that the movie is littered with swear words, including 50 misuses of God’s name. Sexual references pervade many of the jokes, and many people die in large puffs of fairy dust (as “dying outside your fixed time is messy”). But through the weeds of this objectionable content is a story revolving around family reconciliation.
Kennedy Unthank studied journalism at the University of Missouri. He knew he wanted to write for a living when he won a contest for “best fantasy story” while in the 4th grade. What he didn’t know at the time, however, was that he was the only person to submit a story. Regardless, the seed was planted. Kennedy collects and plays board games in his free time, and he loves to talk about biblical apologetics. He thinks the ending of Lost “wasn’t that bad.”
