BLUE BEETLE : Tuesday 26th September 2023.

I saw the M Rated 'BLUE BEETLE' this week, and this American Superhero film is based on the DC Comics character Jaime Reyes/Blue Beetle and serves as the 14th instalment in the DC Extended Universe (DCEU). The film is Directed by the Puerto Rican Angel Manuel Soto, whose previous feature film offerings include 'The Farm' in 2015 and 'Charm City Kings' in 2020. 'Blue Beetle' saw its World Premiere screening on 15th August before its wide release in the US on 18th August, having so far grossed US$125M off the back of a production budget of US$104M, declaring it a Box Office bomb having been the lowest grossing film so far in the DCEU despite receiving generally positive reviews from critics.

The film opens in the remote frozen wasteland of Antarctica, where members of Kord Industries, led by the company's co-founder and CEO Victoria Kord (Susan Sarandon), have located an ancient alien artefact known as the Scarab. In the meantime, recent college graduate from Gotham Law University Jaime Reyes (Xolo Mariduena) returns home to Palmera City full of aspirations for his future, only to find that home is not quite as he left it, and that his family is being evicted due to their financial challenges. Jaime's sister Milagro (Belissa Escobedo) manages to get him a job on the housekeeping team at Victoria Kord's lavish mansion. However, both are fired after Jaime halts a confrontation between Victoria and her niece Jenny (Bruna Marquezine). On the way out Jenny tells Jaime to meet her at Kord Tower the next day to discuss a 'job opportunity' as she is feeling guilty for them both getting sacked. 

The next day, Jenny infiltrates a lab and discovers that Victoria is using the Scarab for her One Man Army Corps (OMAC) project (cyborgs with human bodies transformed by a virus into living machines to assassinate any and all beings with superpowers and to establish Kord Industries as he global dominant player in defence manufacturing). Jenny steals the Scarab but when Kord Tower goes into lock-down following the reported security breach, she avoids the security detail by giving it to Jaime, hidden inside a Big Belly Burger take-out box, but tells him in no uncertain terms not to look inside. At home, Jaime's family convinces him to open the burger box. When Jaime touches the Scarab, it activates and fuses with him, encasing him in an armoured exoskeleton.

Jaime later rescues Jenny from Victoria's armed forces, takes her home and questions her wanting answers. She tells Jaime that the Scarab is a sentient weapon and that it has knowingly chosen Jaime to be its symbiotic host. With the help of Jaime's uncle Rudy (George Lopez), Jaime and Jenny break into Kord Tower to retrieve a smartwatch that once belonged to Jenny's father Ted, but are attacked by Victoria's bodyguard Ignacio Carapax (Raoul Max Trujillo), who has an OMAC prototype infused into his body. The Scarab is revealed to be named Khaji-Da. It takes over Jaime's body temporarily and fights with Carapax. Rudy and Jenny help incapacitate Carapax, then escape to Jenny's childhood home with Jaime, which has been left abandoned for the past fifteen years, since her mother died, and her father disappeared.

Jenny uses Ted's watch to gain access to his hidden laboratory and reveals to Jaime that Ted was originally a vigilante named Blue Beetle who dedicated his lifes work to studying Khaji-Da before mysteriously disappearing, leaving his company in Victoria's hands. When they notice Victoria's helicopter flying toward Jaime's home, Jaime summons Khaji-Da and returns to protect his family. As the family try to escape, Jaime's father, Alberto (Damian Alcazar), suffers a heart attack and dies, which distracts Jaime so allowing Carapax to capture him. Jaime is taken to an island fortress near Cuba, where he is strapped to a machine that downloads information from Khaji-Da to the OMACs. While unconscious, Jaime has a vision of his father, who tells him to embrace his destiny as the new Blue Beetle. Jaime comes around and escapes as Carapax's OMAC suit activates and evolves into a more powerful form.

Jenny, together with Milagro, Rudy, Jaime's mother Rocio (Elpidia Carrillo) and grandmother Nana (Adriana Barraza) use Ted's Bugship and its arsenal of both hi-tech and lo-tech weaponry to storm the island. Jaime is reunited with his family, but then encounters Carapax and battles him. Jaime ultimately has Carapax pinned down and is about to kill him, but Khaji-Da intervenes and reveals to Jaime memories of Carapax's enslavement by Victoria for the OMAC experiments, including Carapax's mother's death at Victoria's hands. This data was uploaded to Khaji-Da when Jaime was strapped to the machine unconscious and so leads Jaime to spare him. Carapax rebels against Victoria and sets his OMAC suit to explode, destroying the island, himself, and Victoria in retaliation for his own mothers death. As the Reyes family and Jenny escape from the island, they take time to mourn Alberto. 

A few days later when the dust has begun to settle, Jenny is appointed the new CEO of Kord Industries and promises to repair the damage caused to the Reyes family, by helping them rebuild their home. As the neighbours gather round what is left of the Reyes family's home and provide both emotional and physical support, Jaime kisses Jenny and then offers to fly her to the Kord Estate. Remain in your seat for a mid-credits sequence, although you won't be missing much if you don't. 

For me I found 'Blue Beetle' to be more of the same run 'o' the mill pedestrian superhero movies that the DCEU seem to churn out with increasing, and frustrating, regularity. There is little new in this film that we haven't seen countless times before, except for the Latino representation which makes for a welcome departure from the norm, but this film is aimed squarely at the family and early teens market for which, judging by the films lacklustre Box Office haul, is sure to find a limited audience. There is little by way of tension or real drama here, the action sequences have become all too predictable, and the storyline borders on the unremarkable. Superhero fatigue is rearing its ugly head!

'Blue Beetle' merits two claps of the Odeon Online clapperboard from a possible five claps. 

-Steve, at Odeon Online-