“Netflix and Chupa?”
Netflix’s latest family-friendly offering “Chupa” has piqued the interest of many – but for a totally different reason.
On the one hand, the film’s depiction of the legendary ‘chupacabra’ is adorable, a complete 180 for the blood-sucking beast. It’s like Mexican ‘E.T.’; kids find an alien creature and must ensure it gets back home while the government hunts it down. Kids will undoubtedly be drawn to the creature's design, even if parents hardly find the story original.
On the other, as many comments have pointed out, “Chupa” has a totally different meaning for Filipinos and Latinos, and certainly not one that kids should be privy to. 8-12 year-olds are one wrong Google search away from having their lives changed forever. We’re pretty sure that parents are none too keen to have *that* discussion this early.
Netflix does address the title's double meaning in the trailer. One of the kids says, “You do know that ‘Chupa’ means ‘sucker’ right?” implying that executives definitely knew that the title would raise eyebrows. On the Netflix blog ‘Tudum', director Jonás Cuarón said the goal was “to create an incredibly cute creature based on a terrifying legend.”
So maybe all this amusement over the title is just adults being too green and naughty, and that youthful innocence will win the day. In any case, “Chupa” drops on Netflix on April 7, but before it does, peep at the Internet’s reactions below.
Imagine the sheer amount of people this title went through at @netflix all the way to “release promo movie poster” for no one to tell them that you can’t shorten the word “chupacabra” with “chupa” because it literally means “to suck off” … like kids should not google this word https://t.co/A3vSEOG5cJ
— El Norte Recuerda (@Vanessid) March 14, 2023
Making a chupacabra movie and calling it just “Chupa” apparently not knowing that if you take away the “cabra” context it's just a sexual word it's the most gringo thing I've seen today https://t.co/Er8ZLjs5bL
— ren nolasco 🗡️ (@ren_nolasco) March 14, 2023
This title was not ran by the Latinos in the marketing department https://t.co/ouoDlnjLGL
— marco finnegan (@marco949) March 14, 2023
time to replace “netflix and chill” with “chupa and chupa” https://t.co/t51WpjNwiY
— 🤖🍑🌸 set me free giveaway (@momotozakis) March 15, 2023
going on google search for chupa and coming out of it a changed man https://t.co/9zai9uoS9I
— john (@mexicanwilddog) March 15, 2023
