Why Officer Martinez From The Batman Looks So Familiar

If you contributed to the nearly $250 million dollars that Matt Reeves' "The Batman" racked up in its first three days alone (via Collider) it's likely you were already familiar with the franchise reboot's most notable names and faces. In fact, its all-star cast — including "Twilight" graduate Robert Pattinson and "Big Little Lies" star Zoë Kravitz in the roles of Batman and Catwoman, not to mention Jeffrey Wright as James Gordon, Colin Farrell as Penguin, and Paul Dano as the Riddler — was undoubtedly a major part of what made the film so irresistible to so many. If, however, you were able to see past some of these blinding Hollywood stars, you may have noticed that some of the film's lesser-mentioned characters were portrayed by some pretty familiar faces. 

Take, for instance, enthusiastic but practical young cop Officer Martinez, who tags along with the not-yet-Commissioner Gordon and even, at one point, helps the abundantly wealthy Bruce Wayne understand how carpets are installed (sort of). If you were able to envision the actor behind the character, Gil Perez-Abraham, sans mustache, you'd likely recall that he's appeared in many projects in TV and film already — just, not usually on the police side of an investigation.

Baltimore, Maryland native Gil Perez-Abraham began his career in the theater industry and various film shorts before landing small roles in NBC's "Shades of Blue" and HBO's "The Young Pope." If you caught director Paolo Sorrentino's 10-episode narrative about a polarizing American pope named Pius XIII (Jude Law), you'd be hard-pressed to forget Perez-Abraham's scenes. In Episode 6, Pius XIII's long-time friend Cardinal Dussolier (Scott Shepherd) is intermittently shown engaging in a threesome that Rolling Stone's Sean T. Collins called "graphic even by HBO standards." 

The cardinal's steamy affair with a Honduran drug lord's wife and, as Collins puts it, "a dude who quietly cries when the cardinal announces that he's leaving" (that "dude" being Perez-Abraham) understandably puts him at odds with the strict new Pope's plan to expose and eliminate homosexual priests with honey traps in the form of male prostitutes. Though the actor isn't given much in the way of dialogue, his moving reaction to Dussolier's departure undoubtedly helped paved the way for his next role.   

Like many up-and-coming actors, Perez-Abraham's nabbed a guest spot in "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" in Season 18's "American Dream" and "Sanctuary." The episodes (20 and 21) see the "SVU" squad team up with the Hate Crime Task Force to solve the brutal attack and double murder of a Muslim family in their own restaurant.

Perez-Abraham's character, Hector Ramirez, is integral to the 2017 episode's exploration of the increasing tensions between Hispanic and Middle Eastern communities in New York. A former disgruntled employee of the restaurant, Hector was one of the crime's three perpetrators, but is released from prison after the case's only eyewitness is deported to Syria. Eventually, Hector makes a confession to protect his own undocumented wife from being deported.

Following his arc on "Law & Order: SVU," the actor went on to appear in a Season 8 episode of "Blue Bloods," titled "The Devil You Know." Perez-Abraham plays new father Jorge, whose newly-delivered baby is taken by an unknown suspect after being left in the care of the nurses. Jorge is suspected of having something to do with the kidnapping. Perez-Abraham gives a compelling and emotional performance as an innocent man who only got to hold his newborn daughter for a few seconds before losing her. In the end, the detectives succeed in reuniting the baby with her parents.

In 2018, the same year he starred in "Blue Bloods," Perez-Abraham landed the role of Blanca's (MJ Rodriguez) unaccepting brother Manuel on the critically-lauded FX drama "Pose." Co-starring Billy Porter, Indya Moore, and more, the series depicts the origin and rise of Ball Culture in New York City in the '80s and '90s.

In Season 1, Episode 5 ("Mother's Day"), Blanca struggles with the decision to attend her estranged mother's funeral but is ultimately convinced she should go by Pray Tell (Porter). Blanca's decision is further complicated when she learns from her (also) estranged sister Carmen (Flor De Liz Perez) that her late mother told the rest of the family that Blanca was dead, rather than accept the fact Blanca was transgender. 

At the funeral, Blanca is met with rejection and hate from her remaining family, including older brother Manuel (Perez-Abraham) who attempts to throw her out. Though Manuel is temporarily (if reluctantly) calmed by Carmen and Pray, things take a turn for the worse following the wake. It's a heartbreaking episode to watch, and one made all the more so by Perez-Abraham's commitment to embodying his hateful character. 

The following year Perez-Abraham played another character named Manuel in another series that engaged in contemporarily-relevant social commentary: Netflix's "Orange Is the New Black." 

In Season 7, Episode 6 ("Trapped in an Elevator"), the audience learns through a series of flashbacks how Maria Ruiz (Jessica Pimentel) ended up in prison in the first place. In the episode, she reflects on her relationship with former partner Yadriel (Ian Paola) prior to her conviction, and as it turns out, she wasn't particularly good to him. 

Maria ended up having an affair with a married man named Manuel, played by Perez-Abraham, who not only attempts to get her to leave her family but succeeds in convincing her to sell counterfeit True Religion jeans and split the excess profits with him. Maria is caught and imprisoned. The audience never learns what becomes of Perez-Abraham's character, but he clearly had a major effect on Maria's life and future.

In 2019, Perez-Abraham made the leap to feature film when he was cast as the male lead in Jacob Akira Okada and Carylanna Taylor's genre-blending narrative, "ANYA." Part modern romance, part sci-fi movie, part meditation on human nature, "ANYA" follows Perez-Abraham's Marco and his wife Libby (Ali Ahn, of "Raising Dion") as they struggle to conceive a child. After three miscarriages, Marco is forced to tell his wife about a belief long-held by those in the insular community into which he was born and eventually left behind: that is, that anyone who leaves the community or marries outside of it is cursed to never have children. Libby, understandably, doesn't believe in the curse and seeks help from her friend Seymour (Motell Gyn Foster), a skilled geneticist. 

What Seymour discovers comes as a surprise to both the film's characters and its audience. Marco isn't cursed — he's a member of an entirely new species, which is why his people (the inhabitants of a fictional island called Narval), can reproduce within their community, but not outside of it. The indie film may not have busted any blocks, but it boasts an impressive 91% rating on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer and helped Perez-Abraham break onto the big screen. 

Perez-Abraham joined the ever-growing "The Walking Dead" universe in the first season of spin-off "The Walking Dead: The World Beyond." In Episode 7, titled "Truth or Dare," the group reflects on their early-apocalypse experiences, while Annet Mahendru's "Huck" Mallick — a former U.S. Marine — grapples with some of her past decisions while still in the corps. In a series of flashbacks, Perez-Abraham plays a fellow Marine and friend of Huck named Drake in scenes that shed light on Huck's past trauma.

The actor then returned to his familiar home on police procedurals in Season 4, Episode 7 of the CBS show "FBI." Perez-Abraham portrayed a struggling addict and father named Hugo Diaz, whose circumstances spiral out of control when his dealer kidnaps his daughter in order to ensure Diaz will pay what he owes. Though the FBI agents eventually convince Diaz to let them help him with the drop so they can arrest and detain the kidnapper, the plan goes up in flames and ends in tragedy.

Given his already-prolific television portfolio and the fact that he's just appeared in the year's most-anticipated franchise reboot, "The Batman," it's likely we'll be seeing a lot more of Gil Perez-Abraham in the years to come.