Chupa is an urban fantasy film produced by 26th Street Pictures. It was released on Netflix in April 2023.
The film opens in a disused mine, where agents of the Mexican government are seeking the rumored chupacabra. They come across a chupacabra cub and its angry mother, who grabs her cub and escapes, getting badly injured in the process. Desperate to save her cub, she leaves him in a bush and sacrifices herself to lure the agents away.
A country away, the teenager Alejandro struggles with other kids' racism and the recent death of his father. He isn't enthusiastic about his upcoming trip to Mexico, but when he crosses paths with a lone chupacabra cub, he finds that the country- and the world- is more wondrous than he thought. Unfortunately, Alejandro's family are not the only people interested in the cub...
This film contains the following tropes:
- A Boy and His X: Alejandro and Chupa follow the usual "troubled child healed by friendship with special animal" template. Unusually for the trope, it's Alejandro's grandfather who finds Chupa, not Alejandro himself.
- Adaptational Attractiveness: Or rather, adaptational cuteness. The chupacabra
of urban legend is a spiny reptilian creature (or, in some depictions, a hairless dog-like creature), not the fluffy griffin-esque mammals they are in the movie. - Always with You: Alex says this to Chupa at the end when they part ways with each other."Just remember, that wherever you are, I will always be by your side."
- But Now I Must Go: Subverted, then played straight. Chupa leaves to go to his family, but comes back when he realises Alex is in trouble. He leaves for real after being saved from Quinn.
- Beware the Nice Ones: Chava, while he may be a polite old man, is also a retired luchador.
- Big Bad: Richard Quinn, who's trying to capture Chupa in order to use his blood for medicinal purposes.
- Big Damn Heroes:
- Chupa saves Alex just as the pipe collapses beneath him.
- Chupa's family come in to attack Quinn's car, giving Chava a chance to make let Chupa go.
- Cassandra Truth: A police officer Quinn calls to help doesn't believe Quinn when he tells him he's looking for a chupacabra.
- Character Title: The film's title comes from the name Alex gives to the chupacabra cub he finds and befriends.
- Chekhov's Skill:
- Chupa's flying ability comes in very handy when he's rescuing Alex from falling to his death.
- Chava's skills as a retired luchador help him rescue Chupa from Quinn.
- Chupacabra: Chupa and his family are all chupacabras (and probably one of the few heroic examples in media).
- Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass: Chava may be an old man who suffers from memory loss, but he's a retired professional luchador.
- Cub Cues Protective Parent: In the opening scene, Quinn and his men try to capture Chupa, who is quickly rescued by an older chupacabra (implied to be his mother).
- Curse Cut Short: Quinn, when chasing the adult chupacabra at the start."Son of a..."
- Decoy Protagonist: Chupa may be the title character, but the film primarily centers around Alex and his family.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Quinn may be trying to capture Chupa to use his blood for medicinal purposes, but he tries his best not to cause any serious harm to the creature, relying only on a tranquilizer gun to knock him out. And, while he does threaten to use a cattle prod on Chupa's family towards the end, he's only doing so in self-defence.
- Evil Poacher: Quinn could qualify, seeing as he's trying to capture Chupa (and there's some implication he's acting outside the law).
- For Science!: Quinn's motive for capturing Chupa is to find out if his blood has medicinal properties, and also to prove the species' existence.
- Giant Flyer: Chupa's family, being fully-grown winged chupacabras.
- Greater-Scope Villain: The unnamed man who hires Quinn to capture Chupa.
- Heroic Sacrifice: Chupa's mother pulls one at the start to save her cub, leading Quinn's men away after hiding her cub in some vegetation. Subverted; it's revealed at the end that she survived.
- Interspecies Friendship: Alex and his family befriend a young chupacabra and protect it from Richard Quinn.
- It's Personal with the Dragon: Despite the Mexican government being the overarching threat in the film, the family's main rivalry is with Quinn since he's the one trying to capture Chupa.
- Large Ham: Richard Quinn often falls into this, being played by Christian Slater.
- Leitmotif: Alex's family has a soft music box theme that plays throughout the film.
- A Lizard Named "Liz": The titular character is a young chupacabra cub named Chupa.
- Little "No": Alex gives a few the second time Chupa is captured by Quinn.
- Masked Luchador: Chava used to be one of these in his younger years.
- My God, What Have I Done?: Alex has a brief moment of this after he accidentally injures his grandfather during a mock wrestling match.
- Non-Malicious Monster: Chupa and his family kill livestock, but they're just wild predators trying to survive in their environment. They never attack humans except in the defence of themselves or their young.
- Not Evil, Just Misunderstood: A seller at the market says this about chupacabras when Alex picks up a figurine of one. As it turns out, he's right.
- Oh, Crap!:
- Alex, Luna and Memo all have one when they hear Chupa in the barn and realise something is wrong.
- Alex gets one when a mountain lion tries to attack him, and then another one a few minutes after when the pipe he is walking on to escape it starts collapsing beneath him. Chupa gets one in the same scene when he realises Alex is in danger.
- Chupa has a brief moment of this when he realises he's about to lose his grip while trying to save Alex from falling off the collapsing pipe.
- Quinn has one towards the end, when his car is attacked by three fully grown chupacabras.
- Poor Communication Kills: Chava and his grandchildren's hostility towards Dr. Quinn could have been avoided if the man hadn't been so vague with his intentions of wanting Chupa.
- "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Chava gives one to Alex during their wrestling match in order to get him to accept his father's death. It later becomes a "No More Holding Back" Speech."Every time your dad gets bought up, you retreat and hide in that stupid game of yours. Face your pain, face your fears and your sorrow. You have to feel the pain of sadness."
- "Rediscovering Roots" Trip: While Beto was alive, he planned that he and his son, Alejandro, would visit their extended family in Mexico. After his death, Alejandro's mother sends him on the trip anyway (though work prevents her from accompanying him), hoping that he will realize his heritage isn't anything to be ashamed of.
- Ridiculously Cute Critter: Chupa may be the cutest chupacabra ever to feature in media.
- Triumphant Reprise: A heroic version of the films main theme plays when Chupa saves Alex from falling to his death.
- Took a Level in Badass: Chupa, when rescuing Alex from falling to his death, finally learns how to fly and uses this to get both of them up to the top of the cliff.
- Utopia Justifies the Means: If Dr. Quinn actually succeeded in capturing Chupa, he would have had the little creature saving all of humanity with his blood at the cost of separating the cub from his family forever.
- Villain Opening Scene: The film opens with Quinn and his men trying to capture Chupa.
- Well-Intentioned Extremist: Quinn, while he is trying to capture Chupa, is only doing so to use his blood for medicinal purposes. He later falls into Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist when it's implied he also wants to capture the creature to prove its existence.
- What Happened to the Mouse?: It's not shown what happens to Quinn after Chava knocks him out with a suplex. Whether he was arrested for breaking and entering or spent the rest of his life in destitution for failing his task is left as an exercise for the viewer.
