Héctor Rivera

###  Likes:

Music, singing and dancing, his family, Día de los Muertos, tacos, tequila, bread of the dead, his daughter, Miguel Rivera, Frida Kahlo, Imelda, Ernesto de la Cruz (formerly), musicians (currently)

### Dislikes:

Being forgotten, his family in danger, upsetting Imelda, musicians (formerly), his action of leaving his family behind, Ernesto and his betrayal, Miguel's "Skeleton walk"

### Occupation(s):

Musician and Guitarist
Con-Man (formerly)

### Goal(s):

Help get Miguel back to the Land of the Living. (succeeded)

### Powers and Abilities:

Musical abilities
Disguise Mastery

## Behind the scenes

### Creator(s):

Adrian Molina
Matthew Aldrich
Jason Katz
Lee Unrich

**Héctor Rivera** (also known as **Papá Héctor**) is the deuteragonist from the 2017 Disney/Pixar film, *Coco.* Héctor is Miguel's great-great grandfather, Mama Coco's father, and Imelda's husband.

In both the original film and the Spanish dubbed version, he was voiced by Gael García Bernal.

## Personality

Initially at the beginning of the movie, Héctor is portrayed as mischievous, sneaky and crafty, being able to put a costume together. There are some people can see through his disguise, including the security guard, although, this was probably because she knew he mostly would try disguises to get the bridge. However, he was able to trick Ernesto de la Cruz and his security team while Héctor posed as Frida Kahlo. Mostly when someone sees Héctor for the first time, they mistake him for a conman. His escapade was quite impressed with young Miguel when he saw him attempting to cross the bridge. He didn't openly trust Héctor and really didn't believe him until Héctor's and Ernesto's argument that they did travel and play music together. Héctor was shown to dislike music almost as much as his estranged family. He believes that all musicians are a bunch of "self important jerks" despite being a musician himself. This was because he grew resentful of Ernesto never giving him credit for the songs that made him famous. However, he made the exception for Chicharrón and played the song. After meeting Miguel again, Héctor shared a love of music again, even becoming a supportive to Miguel and teaching him how to shake off his nerves before a performance.

Héctor also shares a stubbornness with his wife, Imelda and their great-great-grandson, Miguel, as he is stubborn in showing a determination not to change his attitude. He was somewhat desperate in getting to cross the bridge, even desperately getting help from the human child, Miguel to put his photo on an ofrenda when he got home. Héctor was also a protective and fatherly individual, as his fatherly thought was to always love his daughter. Becoming close with Miguel, Héctor became a fatherly figure towards the child, even worriedly searching for him when he ran away to find Frida Kahlo. He was also romantic, expressed through his song "Un Poco Loco for Imelda.

It is shown that Héctor loves his family more than anything, even regretting leaving the family back to travel with de la Cruz. He expressed love towards his daughter, Coco, his grandson Miguel and his wife. He took the blame for not being there for his family, especially admitting his wrong actions to Imelda when apologizing to her. This moves the family to do something about Héctor's deterring health and save him from being forgotten by Coco, who Héctor wanted to know that he loved her so much and was trying to get home to her and Imelda.

It's known that Héctor dislikes being lied to, explicitly shown during his argument with Miguel. He is a well-meaning individual, shown in several cases :Héctor wants to return Miguel back to his family, probably due to the fact that he left his family for the same reason and was only thinking what was best in Miguel's interest and didn't want Miguel to end up just like him, Later , Héctor believed Miguel deserved to know the truth about De La Cruz, a well-meaning truth.

Speaking of which, Ernesto is the foil to Héctor. What parallels him from Ernesto is that he performed music to provide for his family while Ernesto only cares for the attention. Also, Héctor gave Miguel genuine music advice while Ernesto would give terrible advice about fame to Miguel. Instead of a famous musician, he was a talented one. At the end, Héctor was a man who did not ​want fame or fortune or the world to remember him. but one who had a deep love and adoration of his family.

## Physical Appearance

At the beginning of the film, Héctor is a tall, lanky skeleton. When he was alive, Héctor had tan skin. His bones are yellow and brittle due to him being nearly forgotten in the Land of the Dead. He has messy black hair and magenta eyes. When he was alive, Héctor had brown eyes as opposed to the current color. He and his daughter share the same chin and cheek bones.

Héctor also wears a purple jacket, but is missing one sleeve. His right sleeve is torn at the hem of his shoulder sleeve (Héctor and Imelda are the only characters who wear purple. He also wears a red bow neck tie and his hair is also parted just like Miguel. At the end of the film, Héctor gained a much cut and cleaner appearance. His purple sweater was replaced with a purple vest. Originally being barefoot, Héctor now wears brown shoes made by Imelda with love.

## Relationships

### Miguel

    Héctor developed a strong relationship  and fondness for Miguel throughout their interaction in the movie. Due to being a parent himself, Héctor watched out for his then-unknown grandson and acted as a paternal figure. For example, Héctor had immediately went searching for him when Miguel ran off to find Frida Kahlo and did not include swear words in the song "Everyone Knows Juanita" with Miguel present. He later gave Musical advice to Miguel on how to perform in front of others and praised him for his performance afterwards and proudly declared that he was glad Miguel was his great-great-grandson.

After learning Miguel was running from his family,, Héctor later yelled at Miguel for lying to him about not having any other family members besides de la Cruz and chastises him for leaving his family and nearly dragged him back to the Riveras, believing he was doing what was best in Miguel's interests. However,this led to the boy to run from Héctor, who immediately regretted for chasing the boy away and began yelling for Miguel to come back.Though initially angered at Miguel for leaving without holding out his end of the deal, Héctor instead gently asked him to put his photo on his ofrenda for Héctor to see his daughter again. Also, during the conversation with Ernesto, despite not wanting to come between Ernesto and Miguel, Héctor believed that the child deserved to know the truth: that his "grandfather" was a con-man who stole songs Héctor wrote. Later, blinded by anger, Héctor attacked Ernesto, even with Miguel present.

Eventually, the two of them found themselves trapped in a cenote together, Héctor comforted Miguel for de la Cruz' sudden betrayal. It was there that Héctor's relationship with Miguel changed when they were revealed to be related, and both of them smiled when their relation was revealed. Since he was the great-grandson of his daughter, Héctor loved Miguel dearly, as both of them yelled to be proud to be each other's family. He begged Ernesto to spare his living grandson, as he was just a child and shouted in agony when he saw Miguel thrown off the roof. In their final moments together, Héctor called Miguel "m'ijo" as a sign of his affection for his grandson and Miguel called him "Papá Héctor." Shown at the end of the film, Héctor couldn't have been prouder for this great-great-grandson, even smiling when Miguel played "Proud Corazon" for his family.

### Imelda

Héctor and Imelda are husband and wife and each other's true loves.

Prior to Héctor leaving the family on the road, Imelda and Héctor were very much in love with each other. She noted that she loved singing when her husband. Héctor went as far as writing a song for his wife to show his devotion towards her. Imelda was immediately heart-broken when her husband never returned and even went as far to ban music from her household. However, Imelda remained unaware that Héctor was trying to get home to her and Coco for about one-hundred years.

Even as they were both in the land of the Dead, Imelda still refused to speak with him and began to think it was her duty to protect her family from his mistakes. When they saw each other again, Imelda looked at him coldly, with Héctor awkwardly saying that she looks good. Imelda later lashed out on Héctor when he tried helping her off However, after learning the truth from their great-great-grandson, Miguel, she found it hard to forgive her husband. But she did assault Ernesto da la Cruz for murdering her husband, even calling him the love of her life when assaulting him.

A year later, Imelda and Héctor had fully reconciled, even kissing each other and standing next to each other while with their Rivera family.

## Trivia

* Héctor wrote "Un Poco Loco" for Imelda and "Remember Me" for Coco.
* Héctor shares similar personality traits to Flynn Rider from *Tangled* and Nick Wilde from *Zootopia*, as all three of them use their wit to "con" people and don't get along with the protagonist at first until they finally care for their travelling companion (Miguel, Rapunzel and Judy in this case).

## Gallery

Render of Hector and MiguelRender of Hector and Miguel.