This was actually supposed to be the comic you guys were get on Friday and the Live Free or Die Hard comic was the one you were supposed to get last Wednesday. Of course, since my computer completely melted down last Wednesday, the order is all screwed up.

I’m sure it makes no difference to you, but I enjoy being timely with the comics. It’s one advantage the web has over digital media. So, for me, it would have been a lot more fun if I could have gotten the LFoDH comic up on Wednesday when the movie started playing in theaters and having this Ratatouille comic up on Friday before the latest Pixar film was proven a success with a near $50 million opening weekend.

There has been so much crap written about Ratatouille and these concerns that it wouldn’t connect with audiences. Rats in a kitchen? Yech! French cuisine? Double yech! So what? If the story is good, the audience will be there. And I think word of mouth is only going to improve on this thing, from what I’ve been reading.

Marketing aside, the only red flag that came up for me is that the original director Jan Pinkava was replaced by Brad Bird. But then, that’s like having Nolan Ryan come in to finish out a pitching session for a rookie’s first time on the mound. Everything is going to be fine.

Shamefully, I didn’t get to see ANY movies this weekend due to my overwhelming computer issues. What a pain in the ass. I finally got a hold of a new hard drive Friday night and it pretty much took me the rest of the weekend off and on to get Windows XP and the rest of my software loaded back onto it. I didn’t really suffer any significant data loss, but it just takes SO MUCH TIME. Like, HOURS at a stretch, it seems. I don’t really have that kind of free time with Henry in the house. I pretty much stuck him with Cami all day Sunday. Father of the year, over here, gang.

At this point, my concern is falling behind. In addition to Ratatouille, both Cami and I want to see Sicko. But it’s a matter of finding the time and getting someone to babysit Henry. My radar is up for Transformers on Wednesday. Begrudgingly, I think I have to go to this one. Not particularly because I think it’s going to be a good movie (I certainly don’t respect the direction they went in regards to the robot designs) but because I feel like this is the movie everyone is going to be talking about.

In a way, Michael Bay and company were right to wait until the July 4 weekend. It seems like Spider-Man 3, Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End and Shrek the Third all kind of blew their wad by landing in theaters back in May. No one is really talking about them now because I think they all kind of canceled each other out. I’m looking at the upcoming release schedule and I’m not really seeing anything that is going to challenge Transformers dominance. I mean, Harry Potter and The Order of the Phoenix will probably steal some of it’s thunder, but that’s the fifth movie in the franchise and – truthfully – haven’t we seen it all before?

I never thought I would find myself in the position of defending Bay or Transformers, but I really think it’s going to be the blockbuster to beat this summer. It’s going to show us something new. Or at least a big-screen version of a concept we’ve been waiting to see for the last 20 years.

However, unlike Sicko and Ratatouille, Transformers is a movie Cami has no interest in seeing. So I might be able to sneak out of the house Wednesday night after Henry is asleep and check it out for myself. I kind of hate that it’s come to this – me seeing these movies by myself. I used to really like dragging Cami along with me. But I’m kind of stuck between a rock and a hard place. I kind of have to see these bigger movies as part of my "job," but with a baby, you can’t drop what you’re doing and go see everything you want. I feel like I’m being selfish going by myself. But for the immediate future, this looks like the best solution for us.

Oh, well. What about the rest of you? Have you finally started to give in to the Transformers hype