‘It was placed there for a reason’: ‘Blue Beetle’ star addresses ‘Batman’s a fascist’ backlash

With DC’s previous three films all being flops — Black Adam, Shazam! 2, and The Flash — it is seemingly up to Blue Beetle, the next film in their slate, to turn their luck around. Now, the film’s director and star are trying to get ahead of any ill-will from audiences prior to its release by addressing one of its biggest controversies: the dreaded “Batman’s a fascist” line from the trailer.

In a classic example of people taking superhero movies way too seriously, there was a bit of a backlash to the line uttered by George Lopez’s Uncle Rudy in the movie. As an article in MovieMaker correctly pointed out, this was in all likelihood due to “literalists” who “believed that because Rudy holds that view of Batman, it must mean the Blue Beetle filmmakers do, too.”

However, both the director of Blue Beetle, Ángel Manuel Soto and its star, Xolo Maridueña, decided to set the record straight in that regard in a new interview. Soto explained that Rudy is meant to be portrayed as an erratic conspiracy theorist and a basket case, so his opinion isn’t necessarily meant to be taken too seriously. Soto elaborated:

“We always wanted to have fun with the way Rudy talks about other superheroes […] So to the people who got mad at it, give us a chance. We’re just trying to have fun with the characters that we love. And everybody in our movie loves Batman and Superman and Flash […] And of course, we have criticisms about all of them, as we all should. But that doesn’t mean that we hate Batman. We love Batman.”

Maridueña, who plays the titular Blue Beetle, AKA Jaime Reyes, sarcastically quipped back in the interview, “F that!” But in all seriousness, Maridueña noted that audiences should be free to interpret the line how they wish:

“Maybe Jaime and the audience don’t agree with Rudy, but you’re allowed to have your opinion. That’s okay […] If you felt some type of way about it, that was the point. So I think if you agree with it, if you don’t agree with it, it was placed there for a reason. And you know, all of the people who have their Batman shrines at home can keep them there and they don’t have to worry.”

Personally, I always felt that the “Batman’s a fascist!” line was meant to be tongue-in-cheek upon first viewing the trailer. That being said, I wouldn’t necessarily be mad at you for agreeing with the phrase considering Zack Snyder’s oppressively dour interpretation of the character — in which Ben Affleck’s Bruce Wayne scorches the flesh of criminals with a hot branding iron in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice — was technically a thing in this universe when it was originally written. However, Blue Beetle is now being billed as the rebooted DCU’s first hero, so maybe the Snyderverse connection is completely dead now (cue a GIF of Henry Cavill saying “bury it” from BvS). Regardless, the much lighter tone and funny moments of Blue Beetle compared to BvS could signal that DC may finally tap into some of that Marvel magic with its humor and heart. 

We will have to see if Blue Beetle will lead to a shiny box office scarab for DC, or just another underwhelming clump that only attracts the interest of Sisyphean dung beetles when it hits theaters on August 18.