A train-wreck.

That’s literally how “Super 8” starts, and through some sort of cosmic irony, that is also what it is. Let’s get to the story.

Small town, 1979: a whiny, pre-pubescent group of middle schoolers aretrying to make a movie. Their voices crack every other line.

The token overweight kid yells 80 percent of his lines. Dakota Fanning’s little sister (Elle Fanning) looks unmistakably bored. By this point, I am, too.

The kids witness a truck drive into a freight train. The train derails, and cars go flying hundreds of feet into the air, crashing, exploding and forging a post-apocalyptic-looking landscape.

Train cars leapfrog over the panicked children, detonating everywhere except on top of them. None of the kids die.

The story meanders around slowly, and the kids run around for 50 minutes yelling profanities and telling each other to “shut up.”

Dogs get abducted. Lights flicker. The train crash apparently freed an alien/Godzilla aboard. People scream. The military gets involved. There are numerous explosions. The alien is going to eat people.

But luckily Godzilla was being held captive by the military and is mostly just misunderstood.

In perfect “E.T.” fashion, the alien returns home, and the kids are changed forever by how much they miss their new alien friend.

But the lingering question that needs to be asked is: what business did a highly intelligent, indestructible, insect-looking Godzilla alien with telekinetic powers have being on a train?

And why didn’t it break out?

I’m all about suspension of disbelief, but at least give me a reason to do so; even “Sharknado” had a more intense, believable plot than this.

What gets me the most is “Super 8” had so much potential. The 2011 film was produced on a Hollywood budget, boasting names like J.J. Abrams and Steven Spielberg in its credits.

Technically, the movie was extremely well done. It was made for 3-D screenings, and there are at least a few, very realistic looking explosions laced into every few minutes of film.

The soundtrack is top-of-the-line, airing on the side of being a bit too intense for some scenes, however.

“Super 8” is a terrible fusion of two great films: The Goonies and War of the Worlds. Children outsmart every adult in the movie (snore: as if we haven’t seen that before).

But really, J. J. Abrams and Steven Spielberg collaborated for this: a movie that essentially amounts to a fireworks display of neat explosion scenes?

You’ll have to forgive my morbidity, but the film would’ve been so much better if the train crash scene had happened earlier, and the train had taken out all the kids. Then roll the credits.

If you have two hours to burn, do yourself a favor and literally burn them. Take them out of your pocket, and set them on fire, but do not go see this movie.