Cristina Escobar

The Netflix series ‘On My Block’ was one of the rare high-school shows to center people of color. Now the show’s creators are back with a spinoff, ‘Freeridge.’ Set in the same L.A. neighborhood and the same school, the show follows a new set of friends, still four in number, still mixed gender, all people of color, and still fast-talking and mystery-solving.

Latino Rebels’ entertainment correspondent Cristina Escobar gives an account of her first covering the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah last month and discusses the gains made by Latinos in occupying such spaces and the need for more.

Latino Rebels speaks with Chilean filmmaker Christopher Murray, co-writer and director of ‘Sorcery,’ which is set on Chile’s Chiloé Island in 1880 and follows a 13-year-old Huilliche girl, Rosa, as she seeks revenge after a white man kills her father.

Latino Rebels speaks with Venezuelan director and co-writer Patricia Ortega, whose ‘Mamacruz’ is a subtle, complex comedy that never makes its aging protagonist the butt of its jokes, but instead invites us to sympathize with a woman who is finally learning how to be the hero of her own story in her third act.

Latino Rebels speaks with actor and producer Eugenio Derbez, who opened this year’s Sundance Film Festival with ‘Radical,’ which stars Derbez as a middle school teacher in Matamoros who rejects the discipline-based instruction favored by his colleagues.

Latino Rebels speaks with the directors of ‘Going Varsity in Mariachi,’ a documentary that follows a high school’s mariachi band in South Texas as it attempts to win the state championship. The film was shown at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

Even though he’s not playing a Latino, Ramón Rodríguez, star of ABC’s new show ‘Will Trent,’ is still advocating for Latinx communities, saying “it is important to at least do my best to try to push the needle, open new doors, try to create opportunities.”

In Daniel Poliner’s ‘Come Find Me,’ Victoria Cartagena and Sol Miranda play a mother-daughter pair who yo-yo in and out of each other’s lives as they struggle romantically, personally, and professionally. Latino Rebels spoke with the filmmaker and the two Boricua actresses.

Here’s a preview of the Latinx films coming to the Sundance Film Festival this year.

In 2009, Venezuelan filmmaker Marianela Maldonado set out to tell an inspirational story of her country’s famed music program, known simply as El Sistema, or “The System.” After 10 years of filming, her documentary ‘Children of Las Brisas’ tells quite a different tale.

TV and film critic Cristina Escobar reviews her top 10 Latino TV shows of 2022.

When Debby Wolfe learned about the strained relationship between comedic legend George Lopez and his formerly estranged daughter Mayan, she knew it would make for a good story that everyone could relate to — and laugh with. The Salvadoran Gen-Zer now has a hit show on NBC.

The recently announced Netflix series will follow three friends hoping to make it in the world of reggaetón. But when Netflix announced the show, no Boricuas appeared to be behind the camera—either as producers, consultants, or in its eight-person writers’ room.

Latino viewers have become accustomed to cancelations, when something like HBO’s ‘Gordita Chronicles’ earns strong viewership numbers, gets rave critical reviews, and still gets canceled. But Netflix’s ‘Wednesday,’ starring Mexican American and Puerto Rican actress Jenna Ortega, seems destined for a different fate.

By showing people the magic around the corner, Rick Castañeda, director and writer of the film ‘All Sorts,’ hopes to inspire them to seek out a more meaningful path in life — not bad for a kid who grew up working in the fields and dreamed of sitting behind a desk.

A workplace comedy set in the last Blockbuster, the new Netflix series boasts a charismatic cast led by Always Be My Maybe’s Randall Park and Brooklyn Nine-Nine’s Melissa Fumero, and features not one, not two, but THREE Latino characters in its main ensemble.

There’s something particularly Latinx about “spooky season,” maybe because we have a more open —and, I’d argue, healthier— relationship to death and what lies beyond. So it makes sense to spend this month watching films and shows that feature Latinx talent dealing with monsters, murderers, and ghosts.

Sexuality and gender are just some of the raw materials Los Espookys uses to find its laughs, frights, and insights, and its sensibility is what makes it different than almost anything else on TV.

PBS Kids, which Dr. Diaz-Wionczek describes as having “intentional programming that seeks to make a difference” in its DNA, is now running not one but two shows starring Latina girls — actively advancing Latina representation where so many others fall short.

Filmmaker Paul Espinosa is worried the history of the Chicano Civil Rights movement is getting lost, which is partly what inspired him to make ‘Singing Our Way to Freedom,’ a new documentary airing on PBS for Latinx Heritage Month and available via their streaming platform, Passport.

Since its launch in 1999, the New York Latino Film Festival continues growing and features diverse creators—not just along racial and gender lines, but also in what they’re making.