20 Reasons Why You Suck: Red Dawn 2012

I had originally watched the Red Dawn remake several months ago and have been trying to get over it ever since. People say that hate is too strong of a word but to those people I say, “I hate you, and I hate the Red Dawn remake.” For the 500^th time, Hollywood has shown that it has no idea how to reboot or remake a movie. After watching that garbage for the first time I could have literally spent an entire week bashing every single shitty scene of that movie. In fact, my wife was on the verge of stabbing me to shut me up. Fast forward almost a year later and here I am going back to the scene of the crime. I feel like someone who was almost murdered and then had to pick the perpetrator out of a lineup and then testify in court against them; re-living each and every second of that horrible ordeal. Yes, watching this movie again is like re-visiting a horrible crime scene. But I have decided that the truth must be out there. If by watching this movie and posting this review I can save others from the same pain and loss that I suffered then I am willing to jump on the proverbial grenade once more. So please, if you have not seen this movie, read on. If you or someone you know has been affected by this film in a similar way as me then I want you to know that there is help out there. Without further ado, this is 20 reasons why the Red Dawn remake sucks.

1. Pretending that North Korea is a threat to invade the U.S. is just silly. They don’t have enough fuel to fly their two planes over here let alone invade with their entire army.
2. The most cliché-filled football scene ever filmed. The original showed Sheen in a letterman jacket but didn’t have to actually show him playing football. You don’t have to show everything to an audience for them to get that he was a jock.
3. Making the older brother a Marine kinda defeats the purpose of the innocent kids turning into guerrilla fighters’ shtick. It should mean something that these “kids” are willing to die for a cause.
4. I don’t get why they make the dad a cop. Why couldn’t he just be a regular guy? It added nothing to the movie except for the final scenes where they magically find his pistol.
5. I don’t know if “normal” guys in Washington drink Rolling Rock but it just doesn’t scream AMERICA to me. Also, look at the way these kids dress throughout the movie. I guess they thought that just because they were in an extreme survival situation where they were constantly hiding from the enemy, they didn’t want to compromise their fashion sense.
6. I have never seen a HUMVEE that could catch a civilian vehicle.
7. Why would you turn off your only source of news? I understand that it might be hard to listen to radio broadcasts but you’re hiding in the mountains, it might be nice to know what is going on.
8. It is the day after the invasion and the North Koreans already have uniforms for the prisoners in their camps.
9. Instead of the hunting trip with Robert actually meaning something like in the original, they use it to play a prank on their friend.
10. The kids in the original were hiding out in the mountains until they were basically forced to fight. Only then did they decide to take up arms against their invaders. Here, they pretty much immediately start planning and training for it.
11. I understand trying to train them a little but don’t make tons of noise by shooting all of your valuable ammunition and then beat the crap out of each other pretending to teach them hand-to-hand techniques. Good God.
12. A high school kid carrying around an actual picture? No f**king way! All those kids carry around are their cell phones.
13. “Dude, we’re living Call of Duty, and it sucks.” Someone somewhere wrote that line for this movie. There’s also a line where one of the kids says he misses playing Call of Duty…these kids deserved to be water boarded.
14. A scope on an Ak-47 is about as useful as me having a pair of balls on my right foot. It will only make things uncomfortable and it won’t help a damn thing.
15. If they’re fighting North Koreans, where does the kid get the American-issued machine gun?
16. The ease at which they move in and out of the town is incredibly frustrating. It only takes them a few minutes it seems to get back and forth and they were just firing guns back at their camp. Shouldn’t someone have heard them training?
17. Changing the invaders from Chinese to North Koreans because they wanted to be able to make money on the Chinese market is the most cowardly, messed up thing ever.
18. The Daryl in this movie gets a real bad rap. They just assume that he was the one bugged even though it could have been the girl with them. Then instead of maybe going into the woods in a different direction and leading their pursuers away from them he just takes one of their most valuable weapons and stands there, waiting to die.
19. This movie took two years after it was ready to release before they finally released it in 2012. I blame Chris Hemsworth’s success with the Thor franchise on this film finally being released.
20. How is Josh Peck a real actor? Watching him act is like sharing a lifeboat with Fran Drescher and Gilbert Gottfried…just kill me already.

So there you have it. I did a pretty good job of not cursing too much. Trust me, my first draft read like a Quentin Tarantino script minus all the N words. If you haven’t seen the movie, do yourself a favor and avoid it like the plague. If you have already been exposed to it and are noticing some side effects, then I suggest you watch First Blood and Predator immediately and get some rest. You’ll feel better in the morning.