We saw the White House blow up in Independence Day. We saw it blow up again in 2012. As I type this it’s being blown up yet again in theaters in Olympus Has Fallen. Add your own memories here of the White House’s repetitive history of exploding again and again and again at the movies, whether at the hands of terrorists, invaders, or bad weather.

Now add one more death scene to the list, as director Roland Emmerich, the White House’s arch-nemesis, has directed yet another film in which the poor, beleaguered establishment takes a discouraging beating for entertainment’s sake. In the trailer for Emmerich’s new film White House Down, the President’s workspace is targeted neither by aliens nor by Mother Nature. This time the bombs are coming from inside the country:

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White House Down stars Jamie Foxx as another alt-universe Barack Obama and Channing Tatum as an alt-universe Duke from G.I. Joe, except here he’s Secret Service, has a daughter, and isn’t overshadowed by other, older he-men. The all-star supporting cast includes Jason Clarke (the interrogator from Zero Dark Thirty), Richard Jenkins (Cabin in the Woods), Lance Reddick (The Wire, Fringe), Maggie Gyllenhaal, and James Woods as either the bad guy or a high-level annoyance.

My sole reaction after watching this trailer: Again?

Am I the only one who’s kind of tired of seeing the White House repeatedly punched in the face? It’s easily one of the most frequently abused man-made constructs in cinema history, along with the Eiffel Tower, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Chrysler Building, and the Bat-Cave. The White House has died so many times, it should be made an honorary comic book character. The White House has a standing invitation from Spinal Tap to come drum for them anytime.

Granted, other Washington, D.C. locations suffer just as greatly and as often, largely due to their unfortunate proximity — the U.S. Capitol, the Lincoln Memorial, and the Washington Monument catch more than their fair share of fallout and ricochets. Funny how the bad guys who gleefully wreck those highlights along the National Mall manage to miss all other targets in the vicinity. On rare occasions a Smithsonian museum or two might take some hits. Luckily for Arlington Cemetery it’s across the Potomac and out of the line of fire, but the Jefferson Memorial is actually closer to the Washington Monument than the Lincoln Memorial is, yet always remains free of collateral damage. We never see stray missiles or henchmen bombarding other neighbors such as the Vietnam Memorial, the National Aquarium, or the Holocaust Museum. I suppose that’s awfully decent of the villains to know where to draw the line.

Maybe they’re blowing up the White House again because now they have the technology to do it with prettier colors, without miniatures, and with even more egregious slow motion than was indulged in past films. With value-added 1080p HD lethargy, we can pretend its downfall is more emotionally profound, like a Frank Darabont film. Sure, you’ve seen this scene countless times, but when it’s practically freeze-framed so you can count the individual soot particles, now it has all the meanings. That’s worth a rerun, right?

…though that begs a question: Of all the times it’s been wrecked, how many were because of cheap, easy iconography? And how many were because the director hated whoever was in office at the time? I’d be curious to see a pie chart on this.

I’m not that curious to see how this particular White House razing compares to others. Quite the contrary, I instead look forward someday to a science fiction film in which characters in the future grow so weary of rebuilding the White House every five to ten years that they finally wise up, ditch the Greco-Roman architecture, and redesign it as a medieval fortress with twenty-foot-thick walls and a moat the width of Lake Superior.

Regardless: White House Down is scheduled for release in American theaters on June 28th, a week before the Fourth of July. Because nothing says “Happy Birthday, America!” like the time-honored tradition of turning the White House into the world’s largest cherry bomb.