I wanted to like Blue Beetle. I really did.
It’s an underdog film made by a young, talented filmmaker, cast with charming people who don’t get enough time in the limelight. The studio behind it really needs a win in their comic book world. Even the hero, The Blue Beetle, is so obscure, he might as well be a new invention.
I sat down in the theater rooting for the picture. Even as the drab trailers warned otherwise.
Two hours later, I couldn’t get out of my seat fast enough. Blue Beetle isn’t just bad, it’s the worst kind of superhero film – boring.
And when it isn’t boring, it’s insufferably unfunny. Loud, screechy, and tonally all over the place. Jumping from pantomime to melodrama to body horror as if pacing was a mortal enemy of the director. The jokes land with heavy thuds, the emotional beats feel hokey and unearned.
When it does work, it only highlights how poorly everything else clicks. The wonderful Damián Alcázar in particular does some heavy lifting in a nothing part. He imbues the traditional Uncle Ben-part with genuine pathos, leading to the only tender moment of the film.
Xolo Maridueña and Bruna Marquezine are both beautiful and charming as the leads, but I’d be hard-pressed to say what defines their characters beyond superficial beats. Their job is to look good and smile in a way that makes us like them. To that end, they succeed, but it’s not a high bar to clear.
Every problem comes back to the script, which is a cut-and-paste mishmash of all bad superhero tropes from the early 2000s.
The lead character is an annoying twerp who spends most of the film fighting against his powers. Which feels like such a waste of time, since nothing in the picture even hints at the potential that he’d actually do something as interesting as reject them.
Instead, the sentient and alien suit takes over every time a CGI-heavy fight scene kicks in, and handles the work for our hero. It’s an odd choice, since it renders our guide to the world effectively a good host – and little else.
Similarly, what is Susan Sarandon doing in this picture? Her part could just as easily be written out, and it wouldn’t affect the plot one jot. It feels like a colossal waste of a stupendous talent just to repeat the villain from Iron Man without the charm.
But those issues feel inconsequential when compared to how tone-deaf Blue Beetle is at times. A major set piece invokes the terror of an ICE raid, yet the way the film handles it comes off as tasteless and opportunistic. It mines genuine trauma for a cheap emotional gut punch, without ever earning either the terror or the drama.
Similarly, a supposedly triumphant raid on an enemy base feels like the film checking boxes at a focus group screening. Like in the equally atrocious The Flash, the final result stands out like a sore thumb. It neither fits nor feels deserved, and all I wanted was for something original or even mildly entertaining to happen.
Blue Beetle reminds me of Daredevil from the early aughts. It’s the kind of throwback that reminds us just how far we’ve come with comic book movies. But more importantly, it shows us the limitations of this genre. Especially when the studio behind them plays it so safe, the end result is as bland and flavorless as this.
Because Blue Beetle isn’t interesting enough to warrant more than a frustrated shrug. It doesn’t have enough grit or personality or sense of fun to actually leave an impression. By the time I began to write this review, I had forgotten that I’d just seen the film only a few days prior.
Initially scheduled as a direct-to-streaming release, Blue Beetle is the kind of film you wish you could just click away from and watch something, anything, else.