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Capitán Latinoamérica: Superheroes in Cinema, Television, and Web Series by Vinodh Venkatesh

2022; American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese; Volume: 105; Issue: 3 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1353/hpn.2022.0076

2153-6414

Megan Thornton,

Digital Games and Media

Reviewed by: Capitán Latinoamérica: Superheroes in Cinema, Television, and Web Series by Vinodh Venkatesh Megan Thornton Venkatesh, Vinodh. Capitán Latinoamérica: Superheroes in Cinema, Television, and Web Series. SUNY Press, 2020. Pp. 261. ISBN 9781438480152. In Capitán Latinoamérica: Superheroes in Cinema, Television, and Web Series, Vinodh Venkatesh offers a fascinating critical study of the development and representation of the Latin American superhero in popular media and film. The study contextualizes and analyzes twenty-first-century superhero-themed cinema, television, and web series produced in Latin America, situating it within the broader framework of the superhero genre, such as the Marvel and DC universes, in global cinema. By drawing on analyses of print comics and film studies, Capitán Latinoamérica is a groundbreaking study that mediates a lack of coverage on Latin American superheroes on the screen. A thorough introduction provides the framework for Venkatesh’s argument that contemporary Latin American superheroes are a hybrid of regional archetypes and North American blockbuster characters that participate in local conversations about cultural, social, political, and economic anxieties. According to Venkatesh, Latin American superheroes are characters firmly rooted in the digital age of the Internet and smartphones, giving them credence as everyday heroes who hail from the populace and connect to their public through popular mediums. Furthermore, unlike their North American counterparts who masquerade as heroes of the subaltern, Latin American superheroes are true agents of change, questioning the status quo. To support this character blueprint, Venkatesh analyzes Enchufetv’s two YouTube skits, “Superhéroes en Latinoamérica” (2015) and “Superhéroes en Latinoamérica 2” (2015), both of which were filmed in Colombia. This introductory analysis points to several characteristics—the use of [End Page 467] parody and satire, tensions between the North and the South, and a negotiation of masculinity—that are then teased out with case studies in the subsequent chapters. Just like every superhero needs an origin story, chapter 1 of Capitán Latinoamérica traces the origins of the superhero genre in Latin America to Mexico, namely to the television series El Chapulín Colorado (1972–79) and to wrestler films featuring El Santo (1950s onwards). Venkatesh argues that Mexican cinema has served as a contact zone between US cinema and Latin American cinema, allowing for both an emulation and a deconstruction of Hollywood heroes. The characters of El Santo and El Chapulín represent this dichotomy, with El Santo emerging as a local adaptation of Hollywood heroes and El Chapulín operating as a Hollywood rival in the parodic mode. With YouTube reruns, animated reimaginings, and references to both characters in popular culture, contemporary Latin American superheroes continue to evoke their Mexican origins within specific sociocultural, political, and economic contexts. Subsequent chapters offer analyses of several of these twenty-first-century heroes and their media platforms. Chapter 2, for example, focuses on El Man, el superhéroe nacional (2009) from Colombian, director Harold Trompetero, whose main character uses parody and comedy to engage a variety of issues in contemporary Colombia, specifically urban space and gender roles. Chapter 3 shifts the focus to Chile with an analysis of Ernesto Díaz Espinoza’s Mirageman (2007), whose masked hero tries to reconcile the past traumas of the Pinochet dictatorship and the transition to democracy with the need for justice and reconciliation. While these chapters focus on feature-length films, chapters four and five analyze two Central American superheroes who come to life vis-à-vis television and YouTube. In particular, chapter 4 examines Chinche Man (2015), whose title character fights against drug cartels and corrupt police in San Pedro Sula, Honduras; whereas chapter 5 studies Capitán Centroamérica (2011), whose hero fights organized crime in a production from the YouTube channel Puyaweb based in El Salvador. Both productions employ the mode of parody to fight for oppressed citizens, and in an ironic twist of events, the creator of Chinche Man, Igor Padilla, was murdered in 2017 by the same evil forces that his superhero fights to dismantle. Venkatesh concludes Capitán Latinoamérica with an invitation for further study. After a brief summary of the book’s most salient points about Latin American superheroes...