Surprising Robert Rodriguez Movie Is Thriving on Netflix

Robert Rodriquez is known for helming many violent films ranging from Desperado and Sin City to Planet Terror and Machete, but the director also has a lot of family-friendly projects in his filmography. In addition to starting the Spy Kids franchise, Rodriquez also helmed The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3-D back in 2005. The movie was panned by critics and audiences alike and currently has a 20% critics score and 33% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. However, the movie seems to be getting a second life on Netflix. Rodriquez took to Instagram this week to celebrate the movie being in Netflix's Top 10.

"#Repost @taydools well well well, if it isn't Sharkboy & Lavagirl.... at number 5 on @netflixfamily today 🔥🌋🦈 Such a fun surprise to see this! I am always in awe of just how much love Sharkboy & Lavagirl receives after all of these years. THANK YOU for watching 😍 Forever your Lavagirl 😘," Rodriguez shared. The original post was written by Lavagirl actor, Taylor Dooley. You can check it out below:

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A post shared by Robert Rodriguez (@rodriguez)

Sharkboy and Lava Girl Return:

Back in 2020, Rodriguez revived Sharkboy and Lavagirl in another family film for Netflix, We Can Be Heroes. While Taylor Lautner did not step back into the role of Sharkboy, Dooley did play Lavagirl again. Before the movie was released, Rodriguez spoke with ComicBook.com and he talked about bringing back the two characters.

"I always wanted to do something again with them 'cause I just love those characters," Rodriguez shared. "They were like the original little kids' superheroes. And I didn't come up with it, my son did, and I thought, 'Wow, that's amazing.' That's what a kid really loves, empowerment. And why not have shark strength and be half-boy, half-shark, or have the powers of lava? So, when Netflix actually asked me to come up with a movie that was original, not a remake or connected to anything else for their service, and the first thing I came up with was superhero kids and 'We Can Be Heroes,' I had the title. I thought, 'Okay, the parents get captured, kids are gonna save the world, type of thing.'"

Rodriguez continued, "So I delivered them the script and we came up with a bunch of characters. It was like 16 kids with superpowers, but none of them had shark strength, which I kept wanting to steal from that movie because it was such a good one. It was like we cracked the code a long time ago. That was a good one and the lava one... They borrow Spider-Man sometimes for like an Avengers movie, so I would borrow the parents, have them be parents, that way I can have this little super-kid named Guppy who's got both of their powers combined. Why not, instead of having two kids with the powers, have one kid with that combined power. So, they let us do that."

He added, "It also creates .... a 'legit' sort of superhero-parent team, because you recognize at least two of the names, it wasn't all made-up stuff like Miracle Guy and Lightning Fast, you know. 'Sharkboy and Lavagirl, oh, I've heard of them!' Even if you've never seen those movies, after 15 years, somebody's heard about this. So, yeah, that's why it was fun to bring them into this world."

Is We Can Be Heroes Getting a Sequel?

It was previously announced that Rodriguez was working on a sequel to We Can Be Heroes, but there haven't been any recent updates.

"They've been shocked at how well it's kept doing. They call it unstoppable," Rodriguez previously told Collider when speaking about Netflix and We Can Be Heroes. "They've never seen any movie behave like that. It just will not stop. Kids will just not stop watching it. And I think it happened with the Spy Kid movies, but you couldn't ever keep track of it, because you can't tell how many times kids watch it on VCR or watch on Disney channel. But now with their metrics, they can tell how many times a household is watching something again and again, through completion. Which a lot of the times when it's been a big opening weekend, it didn't mean people actually watched the whole movie. It means they watched five minutes or more."

Are you surprised The Adventures of Sharkboy and Lavagirl in 3-D is doing well on Netflix? Tell us in the comments!