Pee Wee's Big Holiday - Movie Review

Details: By Loron Hays; 18 March 2016

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31 years after getting his bike back, Pee Wee Herman hits the road again.

And I couldn’t be happier about the results.

Opening today in select theaters and available through Netflix is the proper sequel to Pee Wee’s Big Adventure. While it is the third film in the series, Pee Wee’s Big Holiday puts everything back together that Big Top Pee Wee unintentionally smashed with its cartoonish treatment of the character. It is indeed a blissful return to form for Paul Reubens who has been teasing this project with Judd Apatow for quite some time.

Complete with the absurdist nature of his humorous stand-up routine, the new chapter manages to produce a feel good buzz that transcends mere nostalgia – even if it is, essentially, patterened after Tim Burton’s film. Pee Wee’s Big Holiday opens – like the aforementioned Pee Wee’s Big Adventure – with a wonky dream sequence and it’s beginning narrative unfolds – also like the previous flick – with Pee Wee’s morning routine. The gags, of course, are different. The sequence is fun, irreverent and catches viewers up with the who and the why in Fairville, a town that is oddly stuck in the 1950’s. It is also where Pee Wee works as a short order cook in a local diner on main street.

Fairville, like Paul Rust’s co-written script, is simple. It doesn’t want to change; it doesn’t have to. But when Joe Manganiello rides his motorcycle into town and knocks on the jukebox three times, Pee Wee gets the push he needs to revisit the world outside of his quaint little town. He shows him his model of the town. They share root beer barrel candy. And, suddenly, Joe has invited him to his birthday party in New York City. It is an invitation that Pee Wee cannot refuse and so begins our absurdist-laced journey across the United States involving salesmen, a snake farm, and Pee Wee’s high pitched scream of holy terror.

And only the 63-year-old Reubens – who has more energy than imaginable – could have pulled it off. He doesn’t miss a beat and his love for the character comes zipping off the screen and right into your lap. People will like this and fans of the character will love it. Especially when Pee Wee goes from being surrounded by 9 willing daughters of a delighted farmer to entertaining the Amish with balloon noises. From falling in line with three female bank robbers (Jessica Pohly, Stephanie Beatriz, and Alia Shawkat) to hitching a ride on a hairstylist’s bus, the subversion left in Pee Wee’s wake is unmistakably original.

Pee Wee’s journey to New York City is filled with memorable sight gags, his precious reactions to adults, and all the insane childish behavior that made Pee Wee’s Playhouse the winner of 22 Emmys during its 4-year run on CBS. Quite simply, nothing about Pee Wee has changed. Thank the maker for that.

Kick reality to the curb, my friends. Pee Wee Herman is back just in time to save us from our boring adult selves.

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MPAA Rating: Not available.
Runtime: 89 mins
Director: John Lee
Writer: Paul Reubens, Paul Rust
Cast: Paul Reubens, Jordan Black, Doug Cox
Genre: Adventure | Comedy
Tagline: He is back!
Memorable Movie Quote: "Haven't you ever wondered what life is like outside Fairview?"
Distributor: Netflix
Official Site:
Release Date: March 18, 2016
DVD/Blu-ray Release Date:
Synopsis: A fateful meeting with a mysterious stranger inspires Pee-wee Herman to take his first-ever holiday in this epic story of friendship and destiny.