“The dead man”: what he is like and what powers the antihero that Bad Bunny will play has

The world of superheroes has a new member and it is an unexpected one. The famous reggaeton singer bad bunny was announced as the protagonist of “The Dead”, the new movie from the Marvel superhero universe, which will be released in theaters in January 2024.

The announcement was made by the company Sony on Twitter, which confirmed in this way that the Puerto Rican will become the first Latino to have a starring role in a Marvel action movie.

In the past, there has already been a Latin Spiderman in the tape “Spider-Man: A new universe” (“Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse”, 2018), but it was an animated film. Bad Bunny will have the leading role in the real-action fiction of which we will give you all the details below.

The character that Bad Bunny will play is based on the antihero Juan Carlos Estrada Sánchez, who has published two comics to date, in which we discover that he is a wrestling fighter who, every time he puts on the classic mask of the fighters, he acquires supernatural strength.

The official Marvel website describes ‘The dead man’ as follows:

“The powers and mask of the amazing wrestler ‘El Muerto’ have been passed down from generation to generation. Each fighter had to prove his worth to his oppressor, called ‘El Dorado’, in order to stay alive and talk about his powers. When Marcus Estrada introduced his son Juan Carlos to “El Dorado”, the young man cowered in fear and did not want to fight him. Marcus Estrada sacrificed his life to try to save Juan Carlos. Out of respect for his father’s bravery, ‘El Dorado’ gave Juan Carlos ten years to travel and become brave, and then duel with a wrestler and unmask him.

Ten years later, ‘The Dead Man’ traveled to New York City and approached J. Jonah Jameson to organize a charity event: a wrestling match, in which ‘The Dead Man’ would fight against Spider-Man. Jonah set up the fight in hopes that ‘The Dead Man’ would defeat and unmask Spider-Man. Although this almost happened, Spider-Man eventually stabbed ‘The Dead Man’ with his stingers, injecting him with a paralyzing poison.

Spider-Man rescued ‘El Muerto’ from the hospital when ‘El Dorado’ arrived to claim his life. ‘El Muerto’ paid it back by helping Spider-Man defeat ‘El Dorado’, who was able to escape before they managed to defeat him.”

As we said above, ‘The dead man’ is distinguished by his strength, which he only acquires thanks to the fighter’s mask, which unites him with characters such as Iron-Man with Black Panther, who obtain special powers thanks to their suits.

According to the comics, with the mask on ‘The dead man’ can lift up to 30 tons of weight. How much strength does he have compared to other heroes? From this figure we can calculate that he is almost as strong as Captain Marvel. In the comics he is often compared to Adam Warlock and Carnage.

It should be noted that this character is in the same timeline as Venom and Morbius, and may have a connection with Tom Holland’s Spider-Man, because, as those who have seen “Spider-Man: No Way Home” remember, in the post-credits scene Venom seems to acknowledge his existence.

It would not be strange then that the film of ‘The Dead’ deals with his family origin and that his search to be worthy of wearing his family’s inherited mask again eventually leads him to Tom Holland’s ‘Spider-Man’.

Although he is world-renowned as a singer, Benito Martínez, ‘Bad Bunny’, is no longer an acting novice. We saw it in 2021 in the third season of the series “Narcos”. In addition, he has starred in the action film “Bullet Train” with Brad Pitt.

The character of “El narco” seems ideal for the Puerto Rican, who is a self-confessed fan of wrestling. Moreover, he is an official member of WWE, where he has had several appearances.

The song “Booker T” was the origin of Benito’s formal link with WWE, as it was the official theme of Royal Rumble, in 2021. To present it, he appeared in the competition and started a ‘rivalry’ with Miz and Morrison, to whom He then faced Wrestlemania 37 with Damián Priest.

“This opportunity that is presented to me to bring ‘El Muerto’ to life is very exciting, it’s incredible”; said Benito at the Sony presentation in which the launch of this title was made official. “I love wrestling, I grew up watching it and now I’m a wrestler. I think it’s the perfect role for me. It will be epic, of that I am sure, ”he declared.

Sony franchises

The film of “The Dead”, which has no announced director or casting, will be released on January 12, 2024 in theaters. These are other franchises that the company has with the Marvel world:

• Three “Spider-Man” movies with Tom Holland.
• “Venom” with Tom Hardy and Michelle Williams.
• “Morbius” with Jared Leto.
• And the Oscar-winning animated film “Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse.”
• Other titles on the way are: “Madame Web”, with Dakota Johnson, announced for July 7, 2023; and “Kraven the Hunter,” with Aaron Taylor-Johnson, scheduled for January 13, 2023.

MORE ON INSTAGRAM…