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Chicago Sun-Times
Chicago Sun-Times
National
Richard Roeper

‘Blue Beetle’ skitters from sweet family moments to tedious superhero battles

The hero of “Blue Beetle” is encased in a magic, Iron Man-like suit that’s permanently attached. (Warner Bros.)

Bug-themed characters abound in the world of comic books. We all know about Spider-Man and Black Widow, Ant-Man and the Wasp and Green Hornet, but you’ve also got Tick and the Fly and Butterfly and Firefly and the Moth and Yellowjacket, not to mention Mantis and how about the Canterbury Cricket! There’s also Bumblebee and Black Tarantula, Killer Moth and Red Bee, Ladybug, Ambush Bug …

Somewhere on the Recognition Chart between Spider-Man and the Canterbury Cricket we have Blue Beetle, who debuted in a 1939 comic book and has been in the DC Comics stable since the early 1980s and is now getting the feature film treatment in an intermittently entertaining, warm-hearted and occasionally funny but ultimately formulaic, middling superhero adventure.

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