Patrick Schwarzenegger Dodging Dad's Shadow Since Midnight Sun, But His Butt Says Otherwise in The White Lotus

Can celebrity kids ever escape their parents' shadows? For Patrick Schwarzenegger, his father's fame creates more barriers to overcome than advantages to gain. From Midnight Sun to The White Lotus, Patrick has always on the way to prove he's different from his father, but he never seems to make it.

Hello Peliplaters!

Recently, Patrick has rocketed to fame for his nude appearance in The White Lotus. However, this is a mixed blessing for him. Many media outlets have framed their coverage around him being "Schwarzenegger's son," even drawing parallels between his viral moment and his father's nude scene in The Terminator (1984) decades ago. There's little focus on Patrick's actual performance—as if his fame still depends entirely on his father's influence.

This isn't really anyone's fault. And truthfully, if you compare their nude scenes side by side, you'll see that Schwarzenegger has indeed passed down his shoulders, waist, and buttocks to his son without reservation:

Arnold Schwarzenegger, The Terminator

Patrick Schwarzenegger, The White Lotus Season 3

In fact, this isn't the first time audiences have drawn connections between the father and son's similarities. Back in Midnight Sun (2018), Patrick's character Charlie was essentially an idol version of Schwarzenegger from a parallel universe—although he has a distinctly different heartthrob face from his father, when he smiles, he looks almost identical to Schwarzenegger:

Patrick Schwarzenegger, Midnight Sun

As for Patrick himself, he has been trying to escape his father's shadow, attempting to forge an acting career path distinct from his dad's.

Midnight Sun is a coming-of-age romance film with a compelling premise: in a small town where everyone leads normal lives, a girl named Katie—who has barely left her house her entire life due to xeroderma pigmentosum—coincidentally meets Charlie, the school heartthrob. All her life, she's only watched him pass by her window, having a crush on him but never able to say hello. What Katie never expected was that Charlie would fall for her the first time they met.

When Patrick first received this script, he might have seen it as his breakthrough role—similar to Ethan Hawke in Before Sunrise, but he seemed to misinterpret Charlie's role in the story and underestimated the challenge of portraying the character effectively.

Indeed, Patrick's performance is quite impressive in the opening scenes where Katie meets Charlie. He embodies a down-to-earth idol quality—friendly and approachable, full of energy yet not overly showy. Compared to many romance film heartthrobs who seem otherworldly in their handsomeness, Patrick's Charlie feels more like someone we might actually encounter in real life.

However, the role offers very limited room to fully demonstrate his personality. Katie can only go out at night, which adds an air of mystery to their romance but also restricts Charlie from showing much curiosity about her—asking too many questions would have made him seem unromantic. During their nighttime dates, Charlie can't be too forward either, as that might make his intentions appear questionable. The most romantic gesture he could offer is taking Katie out of town to see the city lights.

Charlie also has few chances to display tenderness through the little details. With their limited time together, he never truly gets to understand her condition, making any care he shows fall short of what Katie's father and best friends provide. They are the ones who truly know her condition and protect her throughout her life. On a broader level, with his lack of character depth, Charlie comes across to viewers almost as a fu*kboy, as his ignorance of Katie's condition leads to the eventual tragedy.

I believe that for any celebrity kid, it is a significant challenge to portray the tragedy of ordinary people. This isn't about talent or ability, but rather how their privileged upbringing, while providing advantages, also distances them from everyday experiences. Physically, Patrick fitted the role of Charlie, but spiritually, he lacked the relevant life experiences to fully empathize with the character.

As a result, Patrick's attempt to prove himself backfired, and his stiff performance drew considerable criticism. Many viewers questioned whether he secured the role of Charlie purely through family connections. After this setback in Midnight Sun, Patrick pivoted to completely different roles. In Gen V (2023), his bold foray garnered attention, though in retrospect, it's hard to say whether this attention actually benefited his career development.

Gen V is a spin-off of The Boys, and Patrick's character only survives for one episode. His death has an absurdly humorous quality—flying into the air completely engulfed in flames, then exploding. No one knows whether the production team gave him this quick exit out of fear that he couldn't handle the role well.

To be honest, his performance wasn't bad this time. In terms of emotional expression, it was certainly more nuanced than his portrayal of Charlie in Midnight Sun. He still played a campus star, the top-ranked Golden Boy at the superhero academy, but unlike Charlie, this character isn't a poor boy from a small town. Instead, he is a super-powered youth with a background somewhat similar to his real-life family. Character-wise, he has a more compelling motivation than Charlie: seeking revenge against the academy for harming his brother. Since Patrick has a brother in real life, he could naturally express genuine emotion when discovering the academy's inhumane experiments. However, few viewers appreciated this aspect of his performance—most people's attention was drawn to the absurd scene of him exploding mid-air.

Through Gen V, Patrick gained a deeper understanding about escaping his father's shadow: he needed to stop fighting both the audience and himself. He is Schwarzenegger's son, and deliberately avoiding his father's influence only makes him seem disingenuous. Instead of striving to prove how different he is from his father, embracing people's preconceptions will actually help him connect with audiences more effectively.

In the third season of The White Lotus, Patrick completely shed any burden of maintaining a positive image, playing Saxon Ratliff, the eldest son from a wealthy family, and of course, a jerk. While Golden Boy in Gen V is a somewhat polite character, Saxon is the sheer embodiment of vulgarity. His appearance remains respectable, but his mind is filled with obscene thoughts. Every beautiful woman who passes triggers his intense sexual fantasies; he constantly tells dirty jokes to his brother and even makes comments about female chastity to tease his own sister. Though many viewers find Saxon both funny and detestable, some speculate whether his convincing portrayal stems from his real life. What upsets Patrick most, however, are still assumptions that he got this role due to his father. In several interviews, he has expressed sadness about this, "lamenting" that audiences don't see his struggles and dedication—his hundreds of rejected auditions and unwavering commitment to improving his acting skills.

Is Patrick truly upset? In fact, he may have already understood what mindset to maintain when interacting with audiences and how to leverage their interests to generate attention. In those seemingly targeted comments about him, what people truly care about isn't his past, but rather his father, Arnold Schwarzenegger, who remains active in the public eye. Whether criticizing or teasing Patrick, these topics don't originate from him, but from Schwarzenegger's public influence. For viewers who don't care much about this aspect, they are more likely to offer positive feedback—Patrick respects his profession, not only daring to take on diverse roles but also seriously delivering the required performance for each one. In this regard, his fans eagerly anticipate his future performances.

Of course, he might just be giving people more “tea” to split after meals. Either way, audiences are happy to see it.