Blue Beetle finally hits theaters and surprisingly it is one of the better DC movies that’s come out in the last few years. While Blue Beetle is not necessarily one of main DC superheroes, he is an interesting superhero in his own right. You can almost say that he is the Venom of the DC universe. Blue Beetle is very much like Shazam where he’s kind of a B-squad superhero compared to the main Justice League, but just as fun and has a great origin story. Also, he is the first main Hispanic superhero within the DC universe to be brought to the big screen. And honestly, it’s about time. But does the movie hold up? Is it worth seeing? Yes, I thoroughly enjoyed it, and it is certainly worth the price of a movie ticket even if we may not see him in the James Gunn universe. DC is still finishing out stories of what is considered the Snyderverse, but to get a fun superhero movie with a cool and quirky character is still worth it. Plus, Xolo Maridueña from Cobra Kai fame does a great job playing Jaime Reyes. When you start getting to the lesser-known superheroes there’s always a great concern that their stories are not going to be as good as Batman or Superman or even Wonder Woman, but I don’t think that’s necessarily true. Each superhero has their own audience and while the main audience for Blue Beetle is predominantly a Hispanic audience, he very easily crosses over and gives us a fun superhero story.

The movie was a lot of fun with a lot of great characters. It’s hard not to fall in love with the Reyes family as they all come together to deal with the son who accidentally becomes a superhero much like Spider-Man. There’s a lot of great action sequences and of course, the Blue Beetle suit is awesome with a lot of nods to the early Blue Beetle incarnations. There is certainly an emotional connection as the main character is trying to figure it all out because the beetle has formed a symbiosis with him. There is great lore to go with this character considering he wasn’t necessarily the first Blue Beetle. I won’t go into that, you’ll just have to watch the movie, but there’s a great origin story as the mantle of the Blue Beetle passes to Jaime Reyes.

The best parts of this film really are the Reyes family and if there is one actor who steals the show, it’s got to be George Lopez as the crazy conspiracy theorist uncle who also just happens to be a tech wizard. They kind of had to have George Lopez be the most fun-loving character when you kind of have a young relatively unknown cast who can’t quite carry a movie yet, but that will quickly change. If you’re a fan of Cobra Kai then you know Xolo is a great actor I can certainly do action. We may not get a sequel to Blue Beetle and that will be a big shame because he does a great job. It’s a fun superhero movie. This is a great superhero that has its own fun and quirky origin story that you can’t help but love, but is this movie as good as some of the other movies in the Snyderverse…no! To me it very much feels like a Shazam movie… they’re not great, but they’re fun and that’s the point.

As good as the film may be, it certainly isn’t perfect. The biggest issue is having Susan Sarandon as your villain. She’s not a believable villain. Good villains are sympathetic even when they’re psychopaths. Her character is just a jealous woman who never got the credit she felt she was due and therefore seeks world domination through her high-tech beetle-like weapons for the army. She just isn’t a good character and while Susan Sarandon is a very talented actress, she’s kind of miscast in a superhero movie. I spent most of the film hating her in this role, not because she isn’t talented, but her character just wasn’t interesting. I never thought I would say about Susan Sarandon is the worst part of a film, but again it’s just her character. My other biggest complaint is the CGI just looks outdated and gets annoying at times. As a fan pointed out, “Marvel is like the iPhone of CGI in films whereas DC is like a cheap Android that can’t keep up with new technology.” I’m very glad that this wasn’t a 3D movie. Despite my criticisms, overall, it’s a good movie. It’s fun with a great cast especially that of George Lopez and Xolo Maridueña. The film does a perfect job establishing the new Blue Beetle with a great backstory of those who were Blue Beetle before. There are a lot of great callbacks to the Blue Beetle headquarters that if you’ve read the comics you’ll love. It’ll never be praised as being one of the greatest superhero movies ever, but it’s entertaining enough that you may just watch it again. The biggest disappointment is knowing that if we get to see this character again, it will be with a different cast because it’ll be the Blue Beetle in James Gunn’s universe. The film has a lot of stuff to like about it and along with some great action scenes and a lot of wonderful humor, it’s worth checking out, but hard to get excited knowing that this is as far as we’re going to go with this particular cast in a Blue Beetle story. That really sucks because George Lopez was brilliant and born to be a hip Alfredesq sidekick to a superhero. The film is a good 7 but sadly like The Flash it will largely be forgotten in the next year or two as DC reboots its universe.