Classics Illustrated: Red Dawn (1984)

Red Dawn.


What the hell?


Have you guys seen this movie? 


Well, I watched it for the first time last week and to say that my mind was blown doesn't even cover it. Red Dawn is bonkers. For real. In fact, it had such a tremendous impact on me that I was compelled to create these illustrations--a little project that I like to call...Red Drawn.

OK, so, for those who haven't seen it, Patrick Swayze and the venerable Charlie Sheen are brothers.  

C. Thomas Howell--who's wearing the raddest Star Wars hat for the first couple of minutes of the movie--Lea Thompson, and Jennifer Grey round out the cast. 


They're teenagers living in rural-blue jeans-work boots-gun hoarding-1980s-Colorado, defending American soil from commie invaders without the help of any adults. It's essentially Home Alone with only a few, very minor differences. 

The movie begins with a ton of kooky, socialist paratroopers landing right outside of the local high school, which--as any imperialist warlord will tell you--is the most logical place to begin an invasion.

The history teacher--the only black guy in the entire town, possibly the state--leaves the relative safety of the school building, nonchalantly walks up to one of these invaders (who's holding a huge gun, mind you), and asks what's going on. Naturally, he's killed. 

Commies apparently have an infinite supply of ammunition, 'cause this poor guy is shot, like, 20 times in the chest at point-blank range, and then they just start firing indiscriminately. One dude blows up an empty, parked, school bus with a rocket launcher while Swayze, Sheen, and their buds flee the scene. 

The gang get, like, 50 or 60  guns, head up to the mountains, and try to figure out how to proceed. Within minutes of being up there, they're super hungry. I mean, who wouldn't be, right? Like marijuana, full-out, Communist invasions, are notorious for their ability to give you the munchies. So, Swayze and Sheen take C. Thomas Howell hunting. After killing a deer, C. Thomas is peer-pressured into drinking the dead animal's blood--the brothers tell him that it's "the spirit" of the deer and that it'll make him a man or whatever. 

At which point, I start thinking that the whole invasion was just part of an elaborate plan to get him to drink a cup of blood. After munching on deer spirits, the guys go back into town to see if the Communists have left yet and find that their parents and the townspeople who haven't been rocket launchered to death, are being held in a reeducation/POW camp. Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen talk to their dad, who seems like a chill guy at first, but then he starts screaming "Avenge me, avenge me!" 

Apparently the entire invasion, which they're calling "World War III," was a personal attack on him. Patrick Swayze gets all emotional, thinking about his father, how red the dawn is, etc., and starts crying. 

They go back to the mountains, but not before picking up Jennifer Grey and Lea Thompson, who've been living under the floorboards of their grandparents' house. Whether or not they were living under the house before the war started, I don't know. 

The kids make that all-too-common transition from happy-go-lucky teenagers to commie killing guerrillas and start calling themselves the "Wolverines"--ostensibly because their school mascot was the "wolverine" but really I think the name was more about how badass they all thought Wolverine's adamantium claws and huge adamantium crotch bulge were. 

They kill approximately one jillion kabillion commies, and things are pretty sweet considering the circumstances. Eventually, they come across an American pilot who wants to help them. He tells them about the escalating war--a conversation that leads to a very poignant bit of dialogue.

For some reason it's winter now and the Wolverines are betrayed by one of their own. Patrick Swayze has no choice but to kill the dude...

...which makes him sad. He cries again.

Now...eh...I don't know what happens next because I went downstairs to eat a delicious steak.

By the time I came back, things were really starting to go downhill for the Wolverines. Jennifer Grey is wounded and begs Patrick Swayze to shoot her so the enemy won't find her and force her to talk or something. I don't know. Anyway, he can't bring himself to shoot her, so she has to take matters into her own hands. 

Patrick Swayze and Charlie Sheen go into town where they're both shot. Swayze uses what little strength he has to carry his bro to a playground.

The ending isn't a total bummer, though. Lea Thompson delivers this doleful voice over where she assures the audience that America eventually won WWIII.

THE END

...Or is it? 

The Red Dawn remake is being released this year and Connor Cruise--Tom's son--is going to be in it. So, we all have that to look forward to...

If there's a classic movie that you'd like to see illustrated, just leave me a comment or send an email and I'll make your dreams come true.