Even though they aren’t explicitly movie-related, I love drawing comics about the 4th of July because I love making fun of the absurdity of Americans.

Don’t get me wrong, I love my country and I understand the significance of the holiday. But as Americans, we have a certain proclivity of abstracting holidays and assigning new meanings to them.

President’s Day has become more about buying cheap linens at JC Penny’s then celebrating George Washington or Abe Lincoln. Memorial Day has become more commonly recognized as the official kick-off of summer rather than a solemn remembrance of those in the Armed Forces. Hell, in this country, the Super Bowl is practically a holiday! The 4th of July has basically become an excuse to celebrate our country by means of blowing up a small chunk of it.

At any rate, I’m cutting this blog short because I was up WAAAAY too late applying effects to today’s comic and my mind is shot. I had planned on posting a review of Public Enemies (which I saw on Wednesday), but that will have to wait.

To tide you over, I’ll give you the Cliff’s Notes version – The movie is surprisingly long at 2 and a half hours and it isn’t traditional popcorn fare. If you’re a fan of Johnny Depp, you’ll love the movie. He owns it and pretty much 80% of it features him in some context. It makes sense to me now why Christian Bale wasn’t promoted more in the advertising and trailers. He’s barely in this movie. Similar to how Michael Mann yanked us around in Heat, Depp and Bale have only one scene together and it’s about 2 minutes long. So if you were looking forward to Bale going head-to-head with Depp like he did with Hugh Jackman in The Prestige, prepare to be disappointed.

I have a little bit more to say about the supporting performances and the interesting gangland-era personalities that were mixed into the story. Oh, and the “controversy” of Mann shooting the film with digital video. But I’ll leave that for later. Right now, I have to go to bed. Gotta rest up for Saturday so I can put a crater in my backyard with high explosives!

Everyone in America, enjoy the holiday. For Theater Hopper readers elsewhere in the world, have a great weekend!

Talk to you soon!