Machete (character)

Machete, is a fictional character in the four Spy Kids films, the Grindhouse fake trailer, and the Machete and Machete Kills films. The character is played by Danny Trejo.

History
According to Machete director Robert Rodriguez, the character Machete was always intended for Danny Trejo: "When I met Danny, I said, 'This guy should be like the Mexican Jean-Claude Van Damme or Charles Bronson, putting out a movie every year and his name should be Machete. ' "Rodriguez also said, in an interview, that he wrote [Trejo] this idea of a federale from Mexico who gets hired to do hatchet jobs in the U.S. I had heard sometimes FBI or DEA have a really tough job that they don't want to get their own agents killed on, they'll hire an agent from Mexico to come do the job for $25,000. I thought, "That's Machete. He would come and do a really dangerous job for a lot of money to him but for everyone else over here it's peanuts." But I never got around to making it.

While the Machete character first appeared in Spy Kids (2001), it was arguably not the actual Machete as seen in Machete. Trejo noted, [the team behind the film] named Uncle Machete in Spy Kids just as an homage, or whatever you call it, to Machete. We hadn’t done the trailer yet and we didn’t know if that movie was ever going to be made. Robert loved this character, so he named Uncle Machete, the mystery uncle, [after it].

Character
Isador Cortez is a former Mexican Federal. He has his own shop that sells spy gadgets. His weapon of choice is the machete, although he can handle firearms perfectly fine. Cortez is fluent in both Spanish and English. On his chest is a tattoo depicting a female. Machete is related by blood to Juni Cortez and Carmen Cortez, being their uncle.Trejo has described Machete as a "badass", and said that his mother had started calling him "Machete".

Family & Relatives

 * Gregorio Cortez (older brother)
 * Padre Benicio Del Toro (brother)
 * Carmen Cortez (niece)
 * Juni Cortez (nephew)

Film Appearances

 * Spy Kids (2001)
 * Spy Kids 2: The Island of Lost Dreams (2002)
 * Spy Kids 3-D: Game Over (2003)
 * Grindhouse (2007)
 * Machete (2010)
 * Spy Kids: All the Time in the World (2011)
 * Machete Kills (2013)