The question that hovers over every DC Comics movie this year is whether it’ll do enough to justify being part of James Gunn’s new DCU. So far, things haven’t turned out well for Shazam: Fury of the Gods or The Flash. There are still two movies left; Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, and Blue Beetle. But at least for one of them we no longer need to speculate.
Speaking with Total Film, Blue Beetle director Angel Manuel Soto confirms his film has made the cut and will be part of Gunn’s future plans…
“We are part of the universe, we are part of the world, we are part of the plans that they have been creating for the future installments of the DCU,” Soto said.
Soto continued, “But we are not tied to all the films from the past. Yes, our movie lives in the world where superheroes exist. But that doesn’t mean that a certain event, or certain alliance, or certain things from the past dictate where our film is going.”
In other words, don’t expect Gal Gadot’s Wonder Woman to swing in to the rescue. We won’t see star Xolo Maridueña‘s Jaime Reyes hanging out with Billy Batson or anything like that. Instead, he’ll be part of the same universe that will introduce a new Superman.
Blue Beetle was initially planned as an exclusively HBO Max release before that idea got scrapped in favor of theatrical. Soto’s clearly seeing this as the first movie in a potential franchise centered on Reyes, a Latino college grad who gains superpowers when he is bonded to an alien Blue Beetle scarab.
“Our first movie, the way we wanted to do it, was always with the mentality that we wanted to do two more, at least,” Soto said. “And taking the traditional three-act structure of a story, we wanted our first movie to practically be the first act of a saga.”
Blue Beetle hits theaters on August 18th and co-stars Adriana Barraza, Damián Alcázar, Raoul Max Trujillo, Susan Sarandon and George Lopez, and Becky G.
