Xolo Maridueña Was “Totally Terrified” That His Time as Blue Beetle Was Done, But James Gunn “Appreciated What We Made” in First Movie

There may be a new DC Universe under James Gunn and Peter Safran, but Xolo Maridueña is sticking around.

The actor starred in 2023’s Blue Beetle — along the way becoming the first Latino to lead a live-action superhero film — and though Gunn and Safran are overhauling some superhero stories and recasting certain parts for their revamped DCU, Maridueña will remain as Jaime Reyes / Blue Beetle.

At the L.A. premiere of Practical Magic 2, in which he also appears, on Monday, Maridueña told The Hollywood Reporter that he initially wasn’t sure if he would be brought back, as “There’s always that fear, especially with something like a Blue Beetle and the time and the circumstances in which the first movie came out. I was totally terrified that these outside circumstances would inevitably kind of ruin any chance of getting to come back.”

The 2023 film was a disappointment at the box office, but was released amid the 2023 strikes when its stars weren’t able to do any promotion for the project. It had good reviews, though, and Maridueña explained that “James and the greater DC team really valued and really appreciated what we made in the first movie, even though it maybe didn’t perform to the level that they wanted, and now we get to come back. It feels very affirming knowing what we did was recognized and celebrated and we get to join up again.”

His first appearance in the new DCU will be in Gunn’s Superman sequel Man of Tomorrow, set for 2027. In the meantime, Maridueña is starring alongside Sandra Bullock, Nicole Kidman, Joey King and Maisie Williams in Practical Magic 2, which hits theaters Sept. 10.