Bruna Marquezine

            On Saturday morning I worked out the chords for the second verse of “La vie grise” (The Grey Life) by Boris Vian. 

            I finished transcribing from Ultimate Guitar the chords for “Aux enfants de la chance” (To the Children of Chance) by Serge Gainsbourg and looked for more but the few other sites that posted them had the same ones. I started working them out on my own. 

            I played my Kramer electric guitar for the second session of two and it looks like Gian at L’il Demon was right and that the volume problem yesterday was because of my cable. Once I’d made sure the plug was securely inserted the guitar worked fine.

            I weighed 85.5 kilos before breakfast, which is the lightest I’ve been in the morning in a week. I had the last of my Montreal style bagels with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon. 

            Around midday I went to Freedom to pay for my January phone plan. Then I went to No Frills where I bought five bags of grapes, bananas, a pack of back ribs, skyr. Miss Vickie’s chips, and a pack of toilet paper. I notice that stores never call it “toilet paper” but does any individual ever wipe their ass with “bathroom tissue”?

            I weighed 86.6 kilos before lunch. I had Triscuits with artichoke and asiago dip and a glass of half calamansi lemonade and half pomegranate juice. 

            In the afternoon I took a bike ride downtown. 

            I weighed 85.5 kilos at 17:30. 

            I didn’t get caught up on my journal until after dinner. 

            I made a new batch of beef gravy and had some on oven-fish and chips with a glass of beer while watching Blue Beetle. This was the least interesting and least engaging of all the super hero movies I’ve watched this year. 

            Kord Industries finds the Blue Scarab in Antarctica and takes it back to their headquarters.

            Jaime Reyes is returning home after graduating from law school only to find that his family are losing their house and have lost their business. His sister Milagro gets him a job as a servant in Victoria Kord’s mansion. Victoria’s niece Jennifer, the daughter of the founder of Kord Industries, confronts Victoria about the military direction she is taking the company since her father has gone missing and the development of the OMAC (One Man Army Corps). 

            The original OMAC was created by Jack Kirby in 1974 and meant to be DC’s version of a Captain America type super soldier but set in the future. The version in later comics and in this film is very different. 

            While at work Jaime sees Victoria’s bodyguard step towards Jennifer and tells him to back off. As a result Victoria fires both Jaime and Milagro. Jennifer tells Jaime to meet her at Kord Tower about another job. The next day Jennifer sneaks into the Kord lab and steals the Scarab and puts it in a Belly Burger box that the technician had left there. When he comes back he sounds the alarm before Jennifer can get out. On her way out Jaime comes up to her to ask about her offer. She hands him the box, tells him to not open it and to guard it with his life. Back at home his family: his father, mother, grandmother, uncle and sister encourage him to open it. Various family members hold it but when it comes into Jaime’s hand it begins to move and emit energy. It seems to like Jaime and then attaches itself to his face. Then it goes down his back and finally inside him. It burns off his clothes and covers him in the Blue Beetle exoskeleton. Then there is feminine computer voice in his head which announces the beginning of a systems check just before he blasts through the ceiling and into space. Then as another test it lets him fall only to sprout insect wings just before impact. There’s a test of speed and he finally crashes back into his house naked. When he recovers he goes to find Jennifer for answers. He finds her being chased by Kord soldiers and they escape in Uncle Rudy’s car. Jennifer tells him her father found the Scarab when she was a child and it has never been active. It has to choose a host and it has chosen Jaime. She says they need to get the key from the Kord building but there is security. Rudy says he might have a work around. Suddenly he’s a tech genius and he puts together something that causes a cartoon he’s made to appear on all the security cameras at the Kord building. They get the key but are attacked by OMAC. Jaime allows Khaji-da the sentient being in the suit to take over and she fights OMAC. She defeats him and wants to kill him but Jaime stops her. But then when Jaime’s guard is down OMAC attacks again and Jaime gets a concussion. Rudy drives his truck towards OMAC at top speed then slams on the brakes so the truck spins and the heavy equipment on back slams into OMAC. They get Jaime and escape. 

            They go to Jennifer’s father’s abandoned mansion and it’s full of tech. We also see that Ted Kord was the original Blue Beetle but without the powers. Like an amateur Batman. Rudy researches the Scarab with Ted’s computer and says that Jaime is stuck with the Scarab for the rest of his life. Meanwhile Kord soldiers invade the Reyes family home. In the struggle the house catches fire and is gutted. Jaime comes to rescue them His father has a heart attack and dies. This distracts Jaime and OMAC is able to snag him with a neutralizing device called The Claw. Jaime is taken to a special facility where they plan to drain his power and transfer it to OMAC. Jaime’s family go with Jennifer to her father’s house where they get hold of a lot of his high tech weaponry. Milagro gets a shape changing force field glove and grandma gets a big gun which it turns out she knows how to use because she used to be a militant revolutionary in Mexico. They invade the facility while Jaime is being drained. The transfer is complete and Jaime’s consciousness goes to a place where his father meets him and tells him it’s not his time to die. He returns and the suit surges with power again. He breaks free and fights OMAC after Khaji takes a few minutes to power back up. He can make any weapon he imagines in the Beetle suit. After another tedious battle Jaime gets the upper hand and starts beating OMAC to death but for some reason Khaji tells him to stop. Earlier he had to stop her so that doesn’t make much sense. She gives him access to OMAC’s thoughts and learns that he was taken as a child by Victoria, then experimented on and trained. Now he spares OMAC and he sees the light. OMAC goes to Victoria and self destructs, killing them both. 

            Jennifer is now the head of Kord and she says they’ll rebuild and pay for the Reyes house. 

            In the mid credits scene we learn that Ted Kord is still alive. 

            This was really not a very good movie especially considering all the hype. It had a bit of humour around the family that was entertaining. George Lopez was good and funny as Rudy. But this had a made for TV feel like Mighty Morphin Power Rangers or The Beetle Borgs. 

            Jennifer was played by Bruna Marquezine, who at the age of five began working as an interviewer on the Brazilian children’s TV program Gente Inocente. She started acting in telenovelas at the age of 8 and the same year she appeared in the film Xuxa Abracadabra. As a teenager she played Flor de Lys on the soap opera Negocio de China. She moved to adult roles in 2012 starting with the soap opera Salve Jorge. In 2016 she did her first television nude scenes. In 2018 she was a star of Dolce and Gabbana Fashion Week in Milan. She became a poster girl for Karl Lagerfeld. She came in second in the audition to play Supergirl in Flash, Blue Beetle was her first Hollywood role.