Summary
- Director Robert Rodriguez expresses his desire to revisit the “Desperado” series but is concerned about glorifying gun violence in today’s world.
- Rodriguez considers the “Desperado” films to be fun and tongue-in-cheek, but finds it challenging to include guns in his work due to the issue of real-life gun violence.
- While Rodriguez is uncertain about adding to the Mexico Trilogy, he is currently focused on the Spy Kids franchise.
Director Robert Rodriguez declares that he would love to revisit the neo-Western action franchise, Desperado, but has some concerns about returning to such a violent, bullet-riddled world. Speaking with The Wrap, Rodriguez’s desire to make further installments in the Desperado series are hindered by his concerns over real-life gun violence. Check out what he had to say below:
“I would love to revisit the “Desperado” series. I thought it was way ahead of its time. It’s really hard to do today, for me, anything with guns. Gun violence has gotten out of control. Even those are those are very tongue-in-cheek and kind of fun. It’s just hard to do.”
Desperado is actually the second part in the Mexico Trilogy, with the first movie being 1992’s El Mariachi. Released way back in 1995, Desperado stars Antonio Banderas as Manito “El Mariachi,” a man seeking revenge on the drug lord who killed his lover. Written, produced, and directed by Robert Rodriguez, and featuring the breakout role of Salma Hayek, Desperado has become a firm favorite among action movie fans, spawning the sequel Once Upon a Time in Mexico in 2003.
While fans of Desperado would no doubt love to see Rodriguez add to his Mexico Trilogy, the filmmaker is unsure whether it would really be responsible to glorify the use of guns now.
“There’s always some terrible shooting and you just go, I don’t know if I can responsibly do anything with guns. I really love those films, they are so fun. They’re like “Spy Kids” for grownups, with guitar cases that fired missiles and gadgets galore. It was still made by kid. Still the glorification of it would be hard for me to pull off responsibly.”
Robert Rodriguez Returns to the Spy Kids Franchise
For now, Robert Rodriguez is plenty busy revisiting another of his beloved franchises: Spy Kids. Beginning back in 2001, the Spy Kids series follows two kids who must become spies in order to save their parents, who are ex-spies, from an evil mastermind. The director has returned to helm the reboot movie Spy Kids: Armageddon starring Gina Rodriguez, Zachary Levi, Connor Esterson, and Everly Carganilla.
But why has Rodriguez decided that now is the time for more espionage adventures with a new brand of Spy Kids? As he explains it…
“The “Spy Kids” have kids now – Alexa [Vega] has three and Juni [Daryl Sabara] has one. And I was like, Wow, it’s so crazy that I know a lot of people who grew up as kids watching these movies and now they have kids of their own. Time movies fast. I thought it’d be a great time to bring back as a real legacy moment for families, for parents to be able to show their kids the kind of movie they grew up with and have it still have things they remember but have updated gadgets and stuff.”
Spy Kids: Armageddon is now available to stream on Netflix and has been met with mixed reviews.
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
