Remember when Memorial Day weekend signified the kick off of the summer movie season? I do!

My clearest memory of the summer movie blockbuster weekend was in 1977 with the release of Star Wars. My dad wouldn’t take me to it, telling me that it would be on “TV in 10 years.” I did get to see it before its television debut, thanks to my oldest brother and a boatload of pestering on my part.

Times sure have changed. Now, to some degree, I can (gulp) see my dad’s point about the movie-going experience – what with needing a small loan to finance tickets and snacks, coupled with the fact that DVDs come out four months after the films are released.

But if we wait for the DVDs, we miss what the summer movie season is all about, something I learned in eighth grade when I ditched school to see Return of the Jedi.

From May through August is when a true movie-going experience is waiting to be had, where sequels and superheroes offer up plenty of, ahem, bang for my buck.

So far this year we have already had blockbusters throughout May, including Iron Man, which didn’t change my feelings for Gwyneth Paltrow – still don’t like her.

Nearly 20 years since his last crusade, Indiana Jones came out of retirement to explore The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (it was so nice of Steven Spielberg to throw Karen Allen an acting bone).

There have been two films with talking animals in them: The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian and Sex and the City: The Movie. While Narnia’s Aslan may be a wise, talking lion, Sex’s resident cougar, Samantha, will most likely dispense the summer’s best bon vie mots.

Sorry, Speed Racer, looks like you have been the summer’s first box office casualty. Perhaps, with gas prices at an all-time high, a movie about car racing isn’t the kind of escape audiences wanted.

Now, without further adieu (and aging myself more than I already have), here are the rest of the summer movies of 2008.

I was very surprised to see another movie based on “The Incredible Hulk” will steam into theaters, after 2003’s Hulk, well, steamed into theaters like a cinematic turd and stunk the joint up. Hey Hulk – you could have at least lit a match! This time out Edward Norton plays Bruce Banner, and some fake-ass CGI effect plays his “you won’t like me when I’m angry” counterpart – which also hindered the 2003 flick. Maybe this version will answer the question that has always plagued me: Why is it that when Banner transforms into the Hulk, and his shirt rips to shreds that his purple pants remain intact? Maybe he’s not-so-incredible downstairs … or I just have too much time on my hands to wonder such things. Sigh. (June 13)

The Happening is not a remake of the 1967 movie that featured Faye Dunaway in her first big movie role. You mean she did other movies besides Mommie Dearest and Supergirl? Interesting. Rather, it is director M. Night Shyamalan-A-Ding-Dong’s latest thriller. Let’s keep our fingers crossed that this one is a lot better than Lady in the Water, which drowned at the box office. Marky Mark, err, I mean Mark Wahlberg stars in this pulse pounder about escaping from a mysterious and invisible menace – and I thought the scary part was his co-star is named Zooey Deschanel! Say that three times fast! (June 13)

Steve Carell is taking another stab at television – no, “The Office” hasn’t been cancelled. NBC is not that dumb. Carell, however, is attempting to Get Smart on the big screen as Agent Maxwell Smart, immortalized by Don Adams in the 1960s TV series. I think Anne Hathaway is a good choice to portray the fashionable Agent 99, portrayed on the small screen version by Barbara Feldon. Let’s just hope the movie isn’t on par with Smart’s signature phrase: “missed it by that much.” (June 20)

The Love Guru is Mike Myers’ first non-Shrek film foray in five years. But, on an even more exciting front, the film features a Speedo-clad Justin Timberlake! Oh yeah, Jessica Alba’s in it, too – whatever. (June 20)

Johnny-Five is alive! Well, not quite, but the resemblance between the “star” of the 1986 comedy, Short Circuit and this year’s Pixar offering, WALL•E, is uncanny! All they need to complete the homage is a music video with a coked out looking Ally Sheedy, a cardboard cut out of Steve Guttenberg, and El DeBarge asking the musical question, “Who’s WALL•E?” (June 27)

Aside from eagerly awaiting a new Will Ferrell sports-related comedy (what’s next, Shuttlecock, about the competitively hilarious world of badminton?), the movie I am dying to see is The Dark Knight. Not only will this new Batman movie not feature Katie Holmes (Maggie Gyllenhaal is taking over her role), it has two helpings of beefcake – Christian Bale as the titular Dark Knight and Aaron Eckhart as Harvey Dent. Sadly, it is also Heath Ledger’s swan song – but the one who may be crying the most is Priscilla Presley, because she was initially tapped to play The Joker. I kid because I love. (July 18)

It has been six years since “The X-Files” bid farewell to television audiences, and not on the high note it once scored with sci-fi fanatics (yours truly included), who were once entranced by its conspiracy theory mythology. So why is the time right to re-open The X-Files as a movie, 10 years after the first silver screen treatment – I mean aside from satiating Gillian Anderson’s huge lesbian following? Well, I guess the lesson here is never underestimate the fanboys/girls who want to revisit characters. The film’s subtitle: I Want To Believe. So do I. I want to believe that this movie won’t suck! (July 25)

Brendan Fraser will be coming in a movie theater twice this summer! Don’t get the wrong idea. He’s not going the Pee-Wee Herman (Paul Reubens) route. He’s got two flicks in the can – wait that sounds dirty, too! Geez, just look for Brendan in Journey to the Center of the Earth in 3-D on July 11, and The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor on August 1.

Question: What summer would be complete without a few yucks to offset the other movie offerings? Answer: Um, a summer without laughter, and that’s a world I don’t want to live in!

Hottie James Franco is going the Jeff Spicoli route as a stoner who witnesses a murder by a cop – that’s one way to harsh his mellow in Pineapple Express, written by Knocked Up’s Judd Apatow and co-starring Knocked Up’s Seth Rogen – I am sensing a theme here. (August 8).

Ben Stiller headlines Tropic Thunder, in which a group of spoiled actors (including Jack Black, as a flatulence-prone thespian) are involved in making a film about Vietnam with disastrous consequences, (and I am not talking about Tom Cruise’s cameo in the film, either), as the actors are deserted by their director and left to fend for themselves in an actual war. This movie also co-stars Robert Downey, Jr., as an Australian actor who dyes his skin black to play a role in the movie-within-a-movie. Is that comedy gold I smell or just Black’s character? (August 15)

Angelina Jolie returns to her kick-ass roots with Wanted, and no, those lips do not qualify as a lethal weapon – but only Brad Pitt knows that for sure. Ironically, Jolie’s assassin character is out to help a man (James McAvoy) retaliate against those who murdered his father (insert obvious joke about Jolie’s strained relationship with her real-life father, Jon Voight – come on, you can do it!) (June 27)

Are movie-goers prepared for Meryl Streep as a dancing queen, belting out ABBA tunes? Mamma Mia! could go one of two ways: good or bad. I’m hoping it’s good. The trailer for the flick hasn’t sold me, though I love me some Streep and ABBA. Hopefully they will be two great tastes that taste great together. (July 18)

All I can say about the sequel to 2005’s Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants, about a group of girlfriends who share a magical pair of jeans, starring “Ugly Betty’s” America Ferrera, is I hope they use a good detergent. It just sounds unhygienic, even if the pants are of the miraculous variety. (August 8)

Sometimes titles that will be displayed on marquees lend themselves to a little bit of head-scratching, or deserve to have a little fun poked at them (yes, I am a 10-year-old boy at heart). This summer, we have The Foot Fist Way, which just sounds painful, on May 30.

Then there’s Hancock with Will Smith on July 2, which was originally titled Tonight, He Comes – apples and oranges, really.

But the weirdest tagline I have seen was on a poster for the new Eddie Murphy vehicle, Meet Dave, opening on July 11. The tagline read: “Eddie Murphy in Eddie Murphy in Meet Dave.” Upon further investigation, Murphy plays a one-and-a-half-inch tall space creature that inhabits a computerized, full-sized replica of Murphy – guess somebody’s not a size queen.

Sadly, there are only two movies targeted directly at gay audiences – well, three if you count Sex and the City: The Movie. Hopefully Stanford and Anthony get some good screen time.

No Regret, hails from Korea, detailing a love affair between two men, and their effort to rise above the class differences that separate them; the film is to be released sometime in July.

Hamlet 2 has a firm release date of August 22 and has already been a hit at The Sundance Film Festival. The film chronicles an unsuccessful actor (Steve Coogan), whom becomes a high school drama teacher and stages a non-PC musical sequel to Shakespeare’s tragic tale, and he enlists the Tucson Gay Men’s Chorus, who do a rousing rendition of “Rock Me, Sexy Jesus.” The film also co-stars “SNL” fave, Amy Poehler, indie flick darling Catherine Keener and Elisabeth Shue playing a variance on her real self. It is helmed by the director of 1999’s Dick, Andrew Fleming. Yep, sounds like the gayest movie of the summer, Sex and the City: The Movie, non-withstanding.

Even though there is a sparseness of gay characters in movies this summer, there is at least an upswing to that sad, but true, fact – thank God we don’t have to suffer through a sequel to I Now Pronounce You Chuck & Larry. Until next time, that’s all the news that’s fit to print.