Blue Beetle: 9B Collective Details Creative Process Behind Bringing Jaime Reyes's Suit to Life (Exclusive)

Uwandi and Boutté created the concept art that eventually birthed Blue Beetle's costume.

By Liam Crowley

From the first set pictures of Xolo Maridueña donning the scarab-based suit, fans were confident that Blue Beetle would do the popular comic character justice. This past August's DC Studios release tells the story of Jaime Reyes (Maridueña), the third incarnation of Blue Beetle. Reyes is a fairly young character in the grand scheme, first debuting on the comic page in 2006, but has quickly cemented himself as the modern face of the rotating superhero mantle. The Reyes iteration of Blue Beetle has popped up in cartoon shows like Batman: The Brave and the Bold as well as video games such as Injustice 2.

When his live-action movie came around, many were thrilled to see that Maridueña's costume essentially leaped straight from the comic. While the physical creation of that suit is attributed to costume designer Mayes C. Rubeo, the concept creds go to 9B Collective.

This concept art studio is the brainchild of Phillip Boutté Jr. (costume department, Black Panther), Mike Uwandi (costume illustrator, The Book of Boba Fett), and Aldis Hodge (actor, Black Adam). All three men have dozens of individual credits to their resumes, but Blue Beetle represents their first project as 9B Collective.

Bringing 9B Collective's Creative Flavor to Blue Beetle

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(Photo: Warner Bros. Discovery)

Speaking to ComicBook.com, 9B Collective's Mike Uwandi and Phillip Boutté Jr. detailed their unique creative process when it came to bringing Blue Beetle to live-action life.

"We want to modernize what was already existing," Uwandi said. "We really wanted to help build the world but make sure that it was able to stand out amongst the many comic book projects that are out there. One of the cool things with (director) Angel [Manuel Soto] is that he's really into pop culture. He's into things like anime. He's into the comic books as well and brings his own cultural aspects to it. We wanted to find a way to meld all of those things together."

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(Photo: 9B Collective)

"You start with the source material and you respect it because that's why you're here," Boutté said. "I think that one thing that happens sometimes is people lose perspective of the fact that the reason this property ever got to you in the first place is there's already a fan base and it's big enough to garner enough attention to be made into a film. You can't forget that. You have to pay tribute to that. You have to honor it."

Blue Beetle's suit is much more than just a direct translation from the page to the screen. As Boutté noted, the costume is infused with subtleties that he hopes elicits a thought-provoking reaction with viewers a la not understanding a laugh.

"After the movie you'd say, 'What was that joke and why was it funny?' You have to go back and research and learn something new," Boutté said. "We tried to do that visually as well and tried to put in little cues. If you look at Blue Beetle's face, it's inspired by Lucha Libre masks and things of that nature."

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(Photo: 9B Collective)

What made its way to the 127-minute film was just a small taste of what Uwandi and Boutté played with during Blue Beetle's early development.

"There were plenty of things that were cut, but we know that eventually they'll probably be seen if there's a sequel or something like that," Uwandi said. "There was a lot that was cut. We loved a lot of the different designs, but at the same time, I think that they picked all the best ones."

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"There were also little cues in there. The Ted Kord mannequin is missing a suit and it has a pillow attached to it to hint at Fat Ted," Boutté added. "He's gotten a little overweight. There's a lot of little Easter eggs foreshadowing things that could come. It is really wide open to give this character as much legs in the universe as possible."

Blue Beetle is currently in theaters.

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