'Red Dawn' Is Channing Tatum's Greatest Achievement (to Date)

Sober as a Judge is a sporadic series of reviews of recent film atrocities classics from the brilliant legal mind of Judge Scotch Johnson, Esq. Let me start off by saying that even though this movie is called Red Dawn, I didn’t see any time when there was actually a "Red Dawn." [Editor's Note: It's disconcerting that someone who can send people to prison doesn't seem to grasp the whole Commies-are-Reds concept. Guess they didn't teach that in Judge School.]

To be fair, I fell asleep during the last 15 minutes of the film so there may have been one during that time. Anywayyyyyyyyy ...

Channing Tatum is a grown-up marine with a soft, deeper side (you can see it when he’s making love to the camera with his eyes). He doesn’t give a fuck about anyone who asks him questions while he’s at a bar. He also has a tortured past, making him the paragon of a man: a ruthless killer with a sensitive side and a heart of gold. Let me tell you, I thought C-Tates was hot in Magic Mike, but he is a conflagration of sex unto himself in this movie. I love his beard. I’m so used to seeing him cleanshaven, so it was really nice to see this Lumberjack Chic side of him.

Anyway, this is a great movie. C-Tates (<3),  Peeta,  a couple of chicks and C-Tates' really annoying brother team up to kill North Koreans after they (the Koreans) go all World War II paratrooper on the Pacific Northwest and fuck everything up with an EMP. [Editor's Note: Now I'm just confused. The Judge doesn't understand the Commies-are-Reds concept, but does think that EMP is an acronym with which everyone is familiar. FYI, EMP = electromagnetic pulse, for the uninitiated.]

Anyway there’s one chick in this movie who is all over C-Tates' shit from, like, really early on in the movie. She’s at a bar and she’s all like “Oooooo C-Tates' brother, you didn’t tell me your brother grew up in to a sexy Paul Bunyan murderer with a single tear in the corner of his eye because his mom died.” I don’t remember what C-Tates' bro said after that, because this girl was begging to give it away and I just focused on that.

Anyway, so the American band led by Channing (we’re on a first-name basis) [Editor's Note: Pretty sure this is more formal than calling someone C-Tates, but whatever] is hiding out in the hills and being insurgents. Basically Channing is American Osama bin Laden, but like way, way, way hotter and so he’s like masterminding all of these insurgent activities and generally being like, “I’m a killer but you all love me 'cause I’m so hot and such an amazing leader.” Then there’s a couple scenes where Peeta really starts fucking shit up -- just murdering North Koreans left and right. I was really surprised by this since, even though Peeta is strong from lifting sacks of flour in District 12, I thought he never really had that kind of killer instinct. Nice work, Peeta.

So everything was going great with this movie except that C-Tates hadn’t even made a move on this hot chick that was all over his nuts. I was thinking to myself, if I’m C-Tates and I’m basically in a post-apocalyptic world controlled by North Koreans, the first thing I’m gonna do is get with the chick who clearly wants me. C-Tates is definitely a better man than I am, so he was probably thinking “the last thing I want to do is bring a baby into a fucked up world controlled by North Koreans,” which is an admirable sentiment, especially because condoms are not considered “insurgent survival gear” even though they should be. Anyway, as soon as this is really starting to bother me C-Tates gets the chick alone on some old train tracks.

(I was just informed that it’s not C-Tates in this movie, but rather Thor who is the lead character. Either way, he’s still smoldering).

Right when Thor is about to make his move, the North Koreans just firebomb the shit out of the caves they’ve been hiding in. If I were the North Koreans I would have done this much sooner, but if this movie is any indication, they are definitely really dumb. [Editor's Note: I appreciate the respect for how accurately a Hollywood studio may or may not have depicted North Koreans.]

So then, they meet some Marines who are part of the Free American Army or something and infiltrate a base of some kind. After this it got kind of fuzzy because I was tired and fell asleep. I definitely did not pass out from drinking too much.

Great movie.