Left me wanting more

RED DAWN (2012) leaves you feeling you missed out on something. It was all there but somehow you expected more and didn't get it. Maybe I expected too much. I wanted RED DAWN (2012) to be an improvement over the 1984 original but simply got a more or less simpler retelling of the same story but set for the early 21st century. The movie could have benefitted from more story, character development, world-wide story development and involvement, and perhaps a more "macro" view of the whole invasion to flesh out the whole story.

I felt like whoever was responsible for the production and direction of RED DAWN (2012) just wanted to get the movie out as expeditiously and perfunctorily as possible, earn some money on a nationwide release and be done with it. I felt like there was not enough committment to the movie itself.

Still, I purchased the dvd when it came out for my collection. The biggest letdown was switching from Red Chinese soldiers to North Korean. It could have been more plausible because North Korea is a close ally of Red China and no doubt would have supplied a small portion of the total enemy invasion force, say, an entire army corp's worth. Most of the North Korean Army would be left in North Korea as a guard against South Korea. The movie could have explained it that way...Red China invades the whole West Coast while letting its North Korean ally to occupy the Pacific Northwest.