The U.S. vs. John Lennon

...is remarkable mainly for being so tepid, given its charismatic protagonist and its setting during one of the most turbulent periods in modern American history.

The case against John Lennon was jumpstarted by a very scary image, namely, the musician and a black man on daytime TV.

Its laser focus is on the arrogant persecution of Lennon and his wife, Yoko Ono, and their insistence on fighting back.

The Dixie Chicks didn't invent this stuff — other pop stars with unpopular opinions got hung out to dry first. This one was a Beatle. And then he became an antiwar activist during the Vietnam era.

...puts Lennon together as a political animal, examining how his iconoclastic wit and anger turned into conceptual protest.