Director Ángel Manuel Soto of “Blue Beetle” recently faced controversy after a tweet from August 7th, 2018 resurfaced, in which he expressed a desire for President Donald Trump to be assassinated.
The tweet read, “The only thing I hope Trump has similar to Lincoln’s presidency is the way it ended,” referencing the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. The tweet had been live on Twitter until it was shared by Lofti Pixels, after which it was deleted around 3:49 AM on April 4, 2023.
The deletion of the tweet not only came after Lofti Pixels shared it to social media, but also after Soto faced criticism for including a line from George Lopez in the Blue Beetle movie trailer that said, “Batman is a fascist.”
YouTuber Ryan Kinel called out the line saying, “At the end, the Batman is fascist. This is pandering to these stupid fing 20 year-old free profile picture she/them don’t know what your fing gender is, don’t buy comics, don’t have money to go to movies. That’s who that f*ing st is pandering to.” CBMovieFan clipped and shared Kinel’s criticism on Twitter, writing, “George Lopez saying ‘Batman is a Fascist’ has this mf riled up.”
Soto replied with a Skeletor meme saying “My job here is done”
In response to another user pointing out that people were upset about the inclusion of the “Batman is a fascist” line in the trailer, Soto used a similar gif to the one he used in his previous tweet, except he used a clip of President Barack Obama dropping a microphone instead of Skeletor. Also captioned, “My job here is done.”
This is not the first time Soto come under controversy on social media. In another tweet from August 2018, Soto referred to Puerto Rico as a “slave colony” of the United States. The tweet read, “Puerto Rico is a slave colony of the USA. Your passport was imposed on us, so there is nowhere else to go after your country shits on my land and blames us for the stink. F*** you.”
Despite the controversy, Soto recently appeared to be begging members of the media and potential moviegoers to support his film during a Q&A session at the trailer launch. IGN reported Soto telling them and other members of the media, “If you’ll help us and this movie becomes a massive f***ing hit, we’re going to see a lot of those [characters]. That’s what needs to happen.” He added, “If we want to see more variety and really celebrate differences, celebrate culture, celebrate other worlds because it’s fun. The lores are so spectacular. The only way is by supporting movies. Supporting a movie like this.”
In light of the controversy surrounding Soto’s tweets and his inclusion of provocative lines in the “Blue Beetle” trailer, it remains to be seen whether the film will be successful at the box office.
