opening at a theater near you

The summer blockbuster season has descended. What will it be? Reluctant superhero?Romantic comedy? Cops and robbers?

Iron Man, which some have described as a young John McCain with a couple of good arms and a jet pack (sense of humor still intact), didn't quite do the early numbers that had been expected. Who knows, late-summer DVD sales may yet rescue this aging superhero who in reality is lot more like Indiana Jones in a rocking chair. He just can't do the stunts any more so any kind of superhero analogy with McGruff the Crime Dog is always going to be a stretch. McGruff's more like Walter Matthua near the end - all grousing and boyhood hi-jinks but little panache and policy.

Wacky romantic comedies, the ones where the two main characters don't really like each and spend most of the first 3 reels sniping and undermining each other, sometimes play big at the summer drive-ins, but it's unlikely that Clinton-Obama will turn Hepburn-Tracy in the near future.

This just might be the summer of the reluctant anti-hero, the underestimated homeless person who turns out to be Chauncey Gardener, or even the Dark Knight with a quiet posse of determined followers. The big picture where the main character, despite his flaws and hem-haws, ultimately decides to pick up the mantle and run headlong toward 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with everyone chasing him down the street and throwing junk in his way.

Salt the popcorn and pass the Dots. I'm ready for the show.