DC’s ‘Blue Beetle’ to Feature Powerful Latino Cast

If we were already excited about the arrival of “Blue Beetle,” the first superhero movie from DC Films and Warner Bros. to star a Latino character, the news of its powerful Latino cast has left us even more excited.

As reported by TheWrap, actor, and comedian George Lopez, Oscar nominee Adriana Barraza, Elpidia Carrillo, and Damian Alcazar have joined the production, making up one of the most diverse casts in the history of superhero films.

“Cobra Kai” actor Xolo Maridueña will star as Jaime Reyes. Lopez will play the role of Uncle Rudy, Barraza will play Nana, Carrillo will play Rocio, and Alcazar will play Alberto. The four-round out the rest of the Reyes family, including Bellisa Escobedo, who plays Milagro, TheWrap continued.

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“Initially, my goal with finding the family was to be able to have an authentic group of people, not just as authentic on the Latino side, but authentic on the accents and authentic on the experience overall, it was very important for me to have the elders in the family to be from Mexico,” director Angel Manuel Soto told TheWrap. “And more than just being from Mexico is honoring those amazing, beloved actors from Mexico that have paved the way not just in Latin American cinema, but also crossing over to the Anglo Saxon community and Latin American community in the United States.”

Soto added: “And then you have somebody on the younger side, the new blood that’s coming in, like Belissa and Xolo, they’re Mexican American, and tying them with the guys that came before which have a strong history of being born in Mexico and then coming over to the US. Being able to provide a Mexican family, a brown Mexican family, that embraces that level of authenticity, I think this cast allowed us to have all of that.”

“Blue Beetle” will contemporize the story behind a series of American comic books published by various companies since 1939. The most recent of the companies to own the rights to Blue Beetle is DC Comics, which purchased the rights to the character in 1983, using the name for three different characters over the years.

The second Blue Beetle, created by Charlton and later acquired by DC Comics, was Dan Garrett’s successor, known as Ted Kord. Kord “jumped” into the DC Comics universe during the Crisis on Infinite Earths along with other Charlton Comics characters. The second Blue Beetle later starred in his own 24-issue comic book. Kord never had superpowers but used science to create various devices to help him fight crime. He became a member of the Justice League of America and was later killed during DC Comics’ Infinite Crisis crossover.

The third Blue Beetle, created by DC Comics, is Jaime Reyes, a teenager who discovered that the original Blue Beetle’s scarab transformed into a battle suit that allowed him to fight crime and travel through space. Over the years, Reyes became a member of the Teen Titans and starred in two series of Blue Beetle comics. In DC Comics’ 2011 “New 52” reboot, Jaime Reyes was the main Blue Beetle character, only occasionally referencing previous versions. The earlier versions were restored with the subsequent “DC Rebirth” continuity overhaul.

In the new film directed by Soto, Jaime Reyes will discover the Blue Beetle scarab on his way home from school with two of his best friends, Paco and Brenda, half-buried in a disused lot. Reyes takes the beetle home, curious as to what it could be. That night, the scarab comes to life, grafts itself onto the base of Jaime’s spine, and provides him with a suit of alien armor that can be modified to enhance his speed and strength and create weapons and wings and shields.