Cristo Fernández

In Venom: The Last Dance (2024), Cristo Fernández plays a patient barman while Tom Hardy argues with his own shoulder. The scene gives us a useful glimpse of Fernández's comic value: he can accommodate someone else's foolishness without competing with it. We were glad of his patience at the bar, because it let Hardy's bickering double act get on with being funny. Kelly Marcel's film is too distracted by its alien plot to recommend, but its comedy works here.

Ted Lasso (2020) gives that likeability more room, and Dani Rojas remains the clearest reason to seek Fernández out. His breakthrough role draws on his football background, which helps the athletic enthusiasm feel lived rather than put on for the scene. Dani's positivity can sound like a narrow brief for an actor, but Fernández has the comic timing to make it more than a fixed smile. Alongside Jason Sudeikis and a responsive ensemble, he belongs in a programme whose warmth survives an uneven supply of jokes. We like what he brings to it without pretending the cultural clashes around him are always sharp.

The film work since then has mostly offered smaller opportunities: a bartender in Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021), Wheeljack's voice in Transformers: Rise of the Beasts (2023), then the barman in Venom: The Last Dance. These are supporting jobs, and the size of the surrounding films tells us little about what else he might do. Steven Caple Jr.'s Rise of the Beasts has an appealing first hour before the plot and noise take over. It is a mixed film, and we would not recommend it as the next stop after Dani Rojas.

Fernández is frequently asked to be cheerful, energetic and useful at the edge of somebody else's story. He does that work well, and we would like to see him given a character who cannot win people over so readily. Start with Ted Lasso, and hope the next substantial part lets him be difficult.