This piece was written during the 2023 WGA and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Without the labor of the writers and actors currently on strike, the movie being covered here wouldn’t exist.
Poor Blue Beetle. It’s stuck in this limbo between DC superhero movie eras, and never really given a chance. That real life narrative however, flows nicely into the one the movie takes, turning a fun superhero movie into one that’s also surprisingly emotional. Just another day for Xolo Mariduena, who’s been living in meta narratives for the last few years now.
Mariduena stars as Jaime Reyes, first in his family to graduate college, happily returning home to Palmera City to his loving family. Things are not the same for Jaime coming home though: he can’t find a decent job even with his degree, and his mom (Elpidia Carrillo) and dad (Damian Alcazar) can no longer afford to live in his childhood home with a rent spike. Desperate to help his loving family, Jaime is given a silver lining after being fired cleaning arms manufacturing mogul Victoria Kord’s (Susan Sarandon) home. Victoria’s estranged niece Jenny (Bruna Marquezine) is pissed at Victoria’s abuse of power, and offers to give Jaime a job. When Jaime takes her up on that offer, a panicked Jenny gives him a hamburger box containing a blue scarab. That scarab activates when Jaime touches it, starting to bond with his skin and turning him into our Blue Beetle against Jaime’s own wishes.
Family family family. That’s been the lazy out for screenwriters of these superhero movies who need to drum up stakes. Fast X condescendingly abuses that term. Ant-Man leans into it pointlessly in the latest one. It’s as if all these writers forgot why families matter in the first place. Blue Beetle’s writer Gareth Dunnet-Alcocer didn’t, taking the necessary time to build the movie around Jaime’s. The superhero of Blue Beetle is really Jaime’s family, ready to pick each other up when one is down. Mom is the rock, maintaining order in the house. Dad is the heart, always ready to build up someone who needs a pep talk. Jaime’s sister Milagro (Belissa Escobedo) is the funny sidekick, ready with one liners, sarcasm, and willing support. Uncle Rudy (George Lopez) is the IT genius who rises to the occasion with his untapped mechanical potential. And Nana (Adriana Barraza), stoic, incredible Nana, is the muscle, ready and willing to dispatch any imperialists who get in their way. Dunnet-Alcocer balances this nicely with the Kord “family”, who treats emotional attachments as something you can manipulate to your own advantage, or something that needs to be dispelled in order to become your best self.
The other advantage Blue Beetle has going for it is being poor. Do you know how many rich Caucasian superheroes there are? Marvel has had that problem forever, and remember DC was the first one to build a whole superhero movie around not a white guy (but still a princess). Jaime Reyes is the first Latin American headlining a superhero movie, and maybe more importantly, is the first superhero that really feels like he’s an ordinary working class person. As such, things like a house over your head, or even a job matter infinitely more than they do a genius billionaire playboy philanthropist or even a tech whiz kid from Queens. So when those little bastions of comfort and peace are threatened, the movie hits harder. There’s a scene that’s happened in many MCU/DC movies that also happens in Blue Beetle: the raid on the hero’s home by the bad guy. But THIS time, that raid contains ALL of the most important things in Jaime’s life, and the culturally specific metaphor of this situation leaves the audience more freaked out than say when Tony Stark’s house gets invaded by evil robots. Plus, should someone in Jaime’s family get hurt, that’s one fewer thing the family has to rely on, making the sacrifice that much more influential. I was shocked to find myself tearing up multiple times at Blue Beetle, as my mind drifted to these feelings and never ending sacrifice the poor have to make at the expense of progress for the rich. Yes, Blue Beetle’s dialogue spells this out pretty obviously, but nonetheless it’s effective, simply because we rarely see this type of class/ethnic representation on the biggest screen.
I’m pulling for Blue Beetle. For a decade, DC has floundered most of their attempts at creating great superhero movies. This one isn’t great, but it’s much better than most of the trash DC has tried to force down our throats. Worst case scenario? Xolo Mariduena proves he’s got the stuff to be a great leading man. Sensei Lawrence taught him well. Eagle Fang for the win!