2015 will likely be the most lucrative year in Hollywood’s history.  Three of the top six, and four of the top 10 movies in all time box office receipts have been released over the first eight months of this year:  (#3) “Jurassic World”, (#5) Furious 7, (#6) Avengers – Age of Ultron, and (#10) Minions have combined to gross $4.7 billion in world-wide revenue. 

While the surge to the screen this year has been propelled by these animated minions and Jurassic beasts of old, it has been largely powered by heroes.

It is tempting to credit Marvel for singlehandedly reviving the genre, but this year’s “Avenger’s – Age of Ultron” is simply the latest example of what movie-goers expect from blockbusters.  And Hollywood has taken notice.

Paul Rudd gave us “Antman”, Tom Cruise thrilled us with perhaps the best “Mission Impossible” yet (Mission Impossible – Rogue Nation), and though he may be considered an anti-hero, it is impossible not to mention Vin Diesel’s “Furious 7”. 

Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson did his best in a faulty “San Andreas”, there was the acclaimed Tom Hardy reboot of “Mad Max - Fury Road” and Shailene Woodley was not to be out-done in the well paced “Insurgent”.

If we flock to the movies to escape reality, or immerse ourselves in something lacking in real life, then we must be in dire need of real life heroes.  We’ll take them in capes, iron suits or sports cars.  Even the campy “Secret Service” and “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.” played up the calm cool collected hero doing their duty for God and country. 

And for the audience that was victimized by race and violence, “Straight Outta Compton” was embraced as much more than a musical. 

This weekend, moviegoers watched a man fight against all odds to survive in Matt Damon’s “The Martian”.  It was the #1 grossing film at the box office and it wasn’t even close.

In contrast, we must have a lot of male strippers in real life, because we avoided “Magic Mike XXL”, and we clearly have had our fill of condescending racism, because Will Farrell struck out again with “Get Hard”.

Hollywood had better gas up the Brinks trucks, because the Year of The Hero isn’t over yet. 

Before the ball drops on New Year’s Eve ushering in 2016, expect the final installment of the Hunger Games series with “Mocking Jay Part 2” (Nov. 20), “Spectre” starring Daniel Craig as the most prolific hero of all - James Bond (Nov. 6), and the internet breaking “Star Wars – The Force Awakens” (Dec. 18). 

No doubt, the pendulum will swing back to low budget indie film darlings, romantic comedies and thrilling murder mysteries at some point. 

In the meantime, give us a few heroes to balance out the headlines of refugees, corporate cover ups and federal election promises.  We don’t care if they are fighting dinosaurs, shadow organizations or storm troopers.

It’s just nice to know that this year we were only $10.50 away from someone fighting on our side. 

And yes, I will take butter on my popcorn….thank you!