Millions of fans worldwide got to see Xolo Maridueña put on the blue alien suit of armor in the new trailer for DC Studios’ Blue Beetle. It is the second trailer for the upcoming superhero movie slated for an August 18 release. 

Blue Beetle is DC’s first live-action Latino superhero film. It is based on the DC Comics character, and hails from Charm City Kings director Angel Manuel Soto. Gareth Dunnet-Alcocer penned the script.

Tuesday’s trailer reveals more of the titular hero, played by Maridueña, as he becomes the superhero that DC Studios’ co-chairperson and CEO James Gunn has described as the DCU’s first character.

The ‘Cobra Kai’ star discovers a new skill set in the new trailer which shows his character, Jaime Reyes, accepting an alien suit of armor he must learn to control. 

Like DC’s other character, Venom, The Scarab chooses Jaime to be its symbiotic host, and as shown in the first trailer where he dons an incredible suit of armor full of various unpredictable powers — a change that forever alters his life as he becomes Blue Beetle.

In the original comics that first published in Sept. 2011, Reyes is a Mexican-American who lives in El Paso, Texas. He is also the third iteration of the Blue Beetle series hero, first introduced in 2006 as a part of DC Comics Teen Titans. 

It was one of 52 monthly titles and the series was canceled after 17 issues in January 2013. Despite its short run, the iteration is highly known for being one of the very few Latino superheroes in comics.

Blue Beetle was originally planned for an HBO Max release, back when DC was planning movies for the now-rebranded streaming service now known as MAX. It was upgraded to theatrical release and is dated for Aug. 18. 

The film comes as DC has suffered a number of big losses, most recently with The Flash, and Warners is looking to Blue Beetle as well as December’s Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, the final DC film made in the pre-Gunn/Safran era to save the studio’s year. 

Particularly after the box-office bomb and critical failure of 2023’s “The Flash,” Blue Beetle will be crucial moving forward as it will be one of the few holdover characters to be part of James Gunn and Peter Safran’s upcoming DC Universe. 

Gunn and Safran took over as DC Studios co-bosses in November, with their first film set to be Superman: Legacy (due out in July 2025). While Blue Beetle was created as part of the previous regime’s plans, Gunn has said that this version of the character will continue on.

“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 confirmed last month.

Ahead of the film's release next month, Maridueña has teased cameos. Speaking with The Wrap, Maridueña describes Blue Beetle as Green Lantern-meets-Iron Man, and suggests the film will feature appearances from several familiar faces. 

“I think if you’re a DC fan, there’s going to be more than just one character that you recognize. I can tell you that...He’s kind of like a fusion of Green Lantern and Iron Man,” Maridueña said. “He has a scarab from outer space that is attached to his body called Khaji da.”

Alongside Maridueña in the cast includes Oscar winner Susan Sarandon, Harvey Guillén (What We Do in the Shadows), Brazilian star Bruna Marquezine (Breaking Through) as Penny, and Belissa Escobedo (Sex Appeal, Hocus Pocus 2) as Milagro Reyes, George Lopez (The Spy Next Door) as Uncle Rudy, Adrianna Barraza (Babel) as Nana, Elpidia Carrillo (Predator) as Rocio, and Damián Alcázar (Narcos) as Alberto.

Born in Los Angeles, California, Maridueña is of Mexican, Cuban, and Ecuadorian descent. At 16, he had his breakthrough role as Miguel Diaz in Cobra Kai, one of the starring roles in the spinoff show from the 1980s classic, The Karate Kid, streaming on Netflix.

For the 21-year-old, it’s an important role to take on, being the first Latino superhero to star in the DC film universe. 

"The only thing that is on my mind right now is just the fact that he's Latino. I have so much pride in getting to be a part of this project... I think it's so important, and I don’t want to stand on the soapbox for too long but representation is so important,” he said after his casting was officially announced back in 2021. 

Maridueña is one of Hollywood’s newest young Latino stars alongside Jenna Ortega who played Wednesday Addams in Netflix’s new hit Wednesday, who is now proliferated across every kind of media, highlighting the continuing and growing process of growth in Latino representation.