You talked to me today. Right when I needed it. I spent the morning watching Netflix but I can’t remember what until I got to this ironic Batman-esque movie starring Rain Wilson from the American Office called Super. Frank (Wilson) is a loser and that’s okay with him because he has his wife and he once helped a police officer go after a criminal, his two shining moments in life, until his wife leaves him for a drug dealer, Kevin Bacon. He’s the best part because he plays it cool like they’re all buddies before Frank knows what’s going on. He convinces Frank to make him some eggs and tells him they’re the best eggs in the world and asks if they’re the brown ones. They’re not. His wife leaves, and he finds out why, but explains it as a kidnapping. He tries to steal her back by pounding Bacon’s car till he warns “Don’t touch my car again.” Gingerly, defiantly, Frank puts one finger on it, provoking him to lose it. He doesn’t. “That’s not what I meant. Let’s get out of here.”

It’s the start of many misdirects, but it’s also the best, one of the two funny ones. The other is after Wilson dons a super hero costume and crouches behind a dumpster waiting for crime. A day passes and he notes, “Yesterday, there was no crime.”

After the scene with Bacon, Frank reveals he’s had visions from God. Children revealed as Satan. His wife revealed an angel. One more comes after seeing a cheesy Christian super hero TV show, The Holy Avenger (Nathan Fillion), and in this vision, God comes in the form of a Japanese tentacle monster (an earlier scene makes it seem like it’s about to penetrate him but instead it just slices the top of his skull so God can finger his skull). It tells him to be a super hero, to fight crime, to dress like an idiot. He does all of these, but starts small so his failures are small. Kids are buying weed from a dealer and Frank, now the Crimson Bolt, tackles him. They wrestle and Frank loses the struggle and flees. After consulting Libby (Ellen Paige), a local comic book shop employee, he realizes he needs a weapon. He chooses a monkey wrench. It matches his outfit. Now he’s taking down crime. In a montage, he beats child molesters, drug dealers, thieves with varying degrees of gratitude from the distressed. Each time he declares, “You do not deal drugs. You do not molest children. You do not steal.” He’s a little too passionate about beating these low-lifes with his wrench, but it’s done with camp and with quick cuts so we only question it a little. But he’s in line waiting for a movie and these two cut in front of some people. Hearing their dismay, he thinks it’s time the real Frank shows his heroism, no wrench. It doesn’t work so he gets his wrench and his costume from his car and cracks the guy’s skull. It’s the first gore beyond a bloody nose or other expected wounds from a super hero flick. It’s probably not realistic, but it’s gruesome. The guy screams. His wife too. Frank tells her she cut too and he whacks her up the side of the face. The crowd, who only thought of the Crimson Bolt as a joke, now fear he’s a psycho. We’re starting to agree.

But Wilson feels bad. He knows he’s in trouble. He knows favor has turned against him and the line cutters realized his identity as did everyone in line (he changed in the car). The Crimson Bolt’s career is going to be short so he has to rescue his wife while he can. He sneaks onto Bacon’s property, sees his wife talking to Bacon and his goons, and breaks a window. Despite his costume, they immediately recognize him as Frank so they pull their guns. None of the other criminals had guns so apparently Frank isn’t ready to deal with this. The Bolt bolts but gets shot.

Libby, who suspected Frank was the Crimson Bolt, nurses him back to health needing only ten minutes and a whole bottle of alcohol dumped in the wound. Ouch! Then she becomes Bolty, his “kid” sidekick. She’s 22. We’ve lost sympathy for Frank and we’ll never have it for Libby. She’s a sex-crazed lunatic living in a comic-fueled fantasy world posing like cheesecake art heroines. She tries to seduce the morally rigorous Frank, who resists. He’s married. The Crimson Bolt isn’t, so she sneaks in and rapes him, which he submits to. On her first mission, more crouching behind a dumpster, she finds a criminal in a kid who keyed her friend’s car a year ago. Frank is content with scaring him, but Libby goes too far. She kills him. While lecturing her on her recklessness and prepared to end their partnership, Frank is assaulted by Bacon’s men. Libby saves him and the partnership. Frank also kills his first man.

A news report tells us that those beaten by the Crimson Bolt had felony backgrounds so public opinion favors him, but for us, hope for redemption is passed. The audience is now positive he’s a psycho and he’s starting to realize that’s who he has to be to be a hero. He gets guns, bomb building materials, Kevlar, sharp weapons. He’s killed once and it didn’t bother him too much so might as well do it again, so long as they’re villains…I hope. The situation doesn’t really come up, but he’d probably judge them as guilt for littering or some other petty crime.

Now prepared for his final assault, he and Libby head to Bacon’s mansion once more. There’s a drug deal with an African warlord so there are extra men to kill. The deaths are gruesome and made worse for by the KABLAM!-style sound effects written behind the gore.

Soon, the armed men are prepared for the attack. The element of surprise apparently lasts one pipe bomb. They return fire and hit Frank’s Kevlar vest, knocking him over. Libby takes one too, but to the face. Exaggerated for effect, a quarter of her face is blown off. Movie-goers probably went expecting a dark comedy, certainly not Ellen Paige’s brain mulching the lawn.

Fueled by the loss, Frank continues the annihilation until he’s inside the compound. All the no-names die. His wife is raped by the warlord with Bacon’s permission because as he observes, if someone assume she’s just another prostitute, it’s probably time to move on. Bacon kills the warlord in front of Frank and proclaims the two must be buddies, both heroes, just misunderstood. Until now, the car, the rape, the killing, nothing’s fazed Bacon, so when his rage surfaces as he shoots Frank several times, it’s the most horrifying of the many misdirects.

Frank survives it. Bacon and his Bacon bits don’t. Frank’s wife leaves him again, but to get married and have children and Frank accepts her happiness. For some reason, he’s happy too. The public loves The Bolt, but we’re happy to see him go.

As hated as Frank becomes for us, it’s not a bad movie. It’s irony. It’s chaos and anarchy and potentially realism for how super heroes would exist in reality. James Gunn, the director of The Guardians of the Galaxy, deserves this to be called an interesting movie. Maybe it’s more art than entertainment, persuasive and informative rather than moving and relatable. But mostly it’s just disturbing.

I tried writing that like Roger Ebert. He was a master at reviewing films and writing out his thoughts. He gives less plot than I did, but his are meant to ready people for a film and I was just analyzing it.

I don’t know if it shows but that was the best part of my day. The rest was a blur. I watched This is 40, which has a scene where Paul Rudd runs away. Made a cookie, felt sick over it and the soda I washed it down with. Made a video for you. Lady knows I’m depressed and she’s trying to cheer me up but she’s also staying away because she knows I’m not in the mood to play or be fun. Then I went upstairs and started to sleep, but couldn’t. I just lay there crying and thinking about running away and then planned tomorrow to go to the park and sit with your notebook until I could write something. My dad came home and yelled up and you know how that normally irritates me but today I was about to scream back, probably some obscenities, and then I got your email.

We talked. And you sent me that beautiful, sexy photo. I love it. I’ve enjoyed it already a few times. Thank you for emailing me.  

My walk with Lady was a lot better than yesterday, though I really craved Burger King or Hardee’s. Fast food and soda are a few other coping mechanisms of mine. Comfort food and all. I’m trying to resist, to keep exercising, and not be a fat, tooth-rotting mess. I know it’s not important to you that I’m fit, but it’s important to me that you find me sexy.