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Julian Reyes

Julian Ezekiel Reyes was a Puerto Rican American documentary filmmaker and a co-founder of Resonance Films with Kayla Rossi. He directed, edited, and narrated ‘’I Am Still Me: A Minjae Lee Story’‘, which premiered on March 20, 2037, and was acquired by PBS for streaming. Julian lived with epilepsy and several chronic illnesses that affected filming, travel, and editing.

Career

Main article: Resonance Films

Julian and Kayla co-founded Resonance Films as a disability-centered production company in Los Angeles.

Julian had wanted to make films since age six. His father’s family ridiculed his interest in filmmaking, but he continued pursuing it and became a professional filmmaker. His childhood experiences with epilepsy and his later chronic illnesses helped shape Resonance Films’s disability-centered purpose.

Julian attended college but left without completing his degree after repeated medical leaves disrupted his semesters. He continued learning filmmaking outside school. He built Resonance Films from his bedroom, carrying into it the conviction that disabled people deserved films that neither concealed their pain nor reduced them to it. He was exacting about both his camera work and the ethics of what he showed. Filming gave him a steadiness he struggled to feel elsewhere: behind the camera, he could attend closely to another person while controlling the light, sound, and pace of his own work. He also worried that a wrong editorial choice could exploit someone who had trusted him.

Julian was particular about his production equipment and camera setups. An earlier attempt to bring another person into field production went badly: the worker had more experience on big-budget films and treated that experience as grounds to overrule Julian’s equipment and setup decisions. Julian avoided another field hire for a long time afterward.

‘’I Am Still Me’’ developed after the public response to Minjae Lee and Minh Tran’s early-fall-2036 wedding. Julian and producer Kayla Rossi filmed Minjae during multiple visits to Baltimore. They spent the first trip, roughly one week, at the Residence Inn Baltimore at The Johns Hopkins Medical Campus, then used a furnished production apartment at The Lucie for later returns. Julian’s health sometimes interrupted production; a severe cyclic-vomiting episode caused at least one absence that Minjae noticed.

Filming extended over four to five months to accommodate both Minjae’s and Julian’s health. Julian reviewed, edited, and assembled footage between visits, continuing the edit after filming wrapped.

Resonance Films retained the Baltimore apartment while Julian and Kayla returned to Los Angeles between filming blocks. Julian used it for footage backups, early editing, and recovery between shoots; it remained temporary production housing rather than a second permanent residence.

Minjae heavily influenced Julian’s decisions about which footage to keep or cut. Julian knew some people might consider that an editorial risk, but he maintained the approach. He used narration and B-roll sparingly in the documentary. Tense scenes of the family trying to calm Minjae and footage of medical episodes largely relied on the recorded encounters, with minimal narration when needed to explain practical developments such as a hospital transfer. Minjae explained in the film why he wanted them included. Asked about his approach, Julian said, “It’s not my story to tell.”

The documentary premiered in 2037 and was later acquired by PBS.

After the documentary’s release, Resonance Films received more requests and projects. Julian’s health and the increasing workload made it harder for him to manage equipment and setups alongside filming. Delegating that work would leave him more energy for the camera, but the earlier hiring experience made him wary of handing his equipment to another field worker.

Main article: Simon Reed Interview at Resonance Films (2037) - Event

Main article: Julian Reyes and Simon Reed

Julian and Kayla interviewed Simon Reed for the equipment role in 2037. Simon’s account of a past mistake, apology, and changed practice mattered to Julian as he considered trusting another person with his camera.

Health, Disability, and Access

Julian had focal epilepsy, cyclic vomiting syndrome, chronic migraines, reflux, POTS, autism, ADHD, and complex PTSD related to emotional and sexual abuse within his family. His paternal grandfather emotionally and sexually abused him, and his paternal uncle Marco was complicit; both relatives were involved in the emotional abuse.

His epilepsy began around age ten to twelve. As a child, he was called dramatic and told that epilepsy was not serious, dismissals that stayed with him as he grew into a disabled filmmaker. Julian experienced brief focal seizures, sometimes involving stiffness, an arm twitch, or a period of altered awareness, as well as focal seizures that spread into bilateral tonic-clonic seizures. His warning auras included a metallic taste and a sudden dropping sensation in his stomach, although neither occurred before every seizure. He also distinguished the frequent, relatively static nausea caused by his cyclic vomiting syndrome, reflux, and migraines from nausea that continued building as seizure activity approached. Because nausea was part of several conditions, its change in intensity and progression was more informative to him than its presence alone. Medication usually helped manage his epilepsy, but he still had breakthrough seizures, particularly when severely sleep-deprived or under stress. Afterward, he could be physically exhausted, cognitively foggy, and slow or slurred in speech; he tended to retreat into himself while recovering.

His seizures could occur while he was asleep. Transitions into and out of sleep also increased his risk, particularly when he was startled into sudden alertness while waking. Kayla woke him gradually and gave him time to reach full awareness and functional wakefulness before expecting him to speak, stand, or resume an activity. The same routine accommodated the ordinary difficulty he sometimes had waking when exhausted, but its primary purpose was seizure prevention and recovery.

Bright flashing or strobing light could trigger both Julian’s seizures and his migraines. His migraines brought light sensitivity, queasiness, and severe head pain. He sometimes used tinted lenses while editing and blackout curtains where he slept. His work routines accommodated that photosensitivity, along with nausea, fatigue, and periods when he could not film or edit. Kayla handled production coordination and other operational work when Julian’s symptoms limited him.

His cyclic vomiting syndrome could keep him nauseated and vomiting for hours or days. Stress and lost sleep could precede an episode; at times nighttime reflux and morning nausea were the first signs that a longer cycle was coming. Julian had learned to vomit so quietly that someone unfamiliar with him might miss it. During one filming-period episode, his temperature rose as he became depleted and trembled, unable to keep down food or drink. Between episodes, he ate cautiously and used anti-nausea medication. His reflux could also wake him with coughing, choking, and a burning throat. He often favored small portions and soft foods, but careful eating did not eliminate his symptoms.

POTS brought lightheadedness, a racing heart on standing, and fatigue; Julian sometimes moved carefully or sat while filming, and Kayla could take heavier equipment. His autism and ADHD affected his sensory tolerance and work routines. He could become absorbed in editing for hours and forget meals or medication, while scheduling, finances, and email were much harder for him to manage than the creative work. Kayla handled much of that logistical work and sometimes closed his laptop when he could not pull himself away.

Julian’s complex PTSD remained present in ordinary moments as well as crises. He startled at raised voices or sudden movements, disliked unexpected touch, and scanned rooms for signs of danger. Sleep could feel unsafe because it meant surrendering awareness of his surroundings, even when Kayla was beside him. He also struggled to admit pain or fatigue, fearful that needing care would make him a burden. Nightmares and difficulty sleeping could compound the physical effects of his illnesses.

When exhaustion and a larger-than-tolerated meal compounded Julian’s reflux, food could return into his mouth without forceful retching or significant physical pain. He kept emesis bags available during travel because the regurgitation could recur with little warning. Although the episodes were not among his most physically painful symptoms, they damaged his self-image. Julian experienced the loss of bodily control as humiliating and connected it with his fears of appearing incapable, dependent, or insufficiently masculine.

Julian’s panic attacks could involve difficulty breathing and gagging. Kayla was familiar with this pattern and helped soothe him when it occurred.

During the production of ‘’I Am Still Me’‘, Julian had a panic attack after learning that an unidentified person had left a large unmarked package at his Los Angeles apartment while he and Kayla were in Baltimore. An accusatory online thread about the documentary intensified his fear that someone had found their home and might have placed something dangerous inside the box. While seated on the edge of the bed with Kayla holding his hands, Julian became pale and unable to explain that he felt faint, then briefly lost consciousness and fell backward onto the mattress. His pulse remained fast, and he recovered quickly after Kayla laid him flat and elevated his legs. Kayla treated the episode as probable autonomic syncope while monitoring for seizure activity because his epilepsy complicated the initial distinction.

Julian experienced recurrent syncope as a separate clinical problem rather than as a symptom fully explained by POTS. His POTS and autonomic susceptibility remained relevant to individual episodes, but his epilepsy and the possibility of a cardiac cause required continued differentiation. His maternal grandfather, Ruben Alvarez, had obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, establishing a maternal family history of a potentially inherited cardiac condition. Zeek’s recurrent unexplained syncope and sudden death at twenty created an additional paternal concern. Neither history established the cause of Julian’s fainting, and no specific cardiac disorder had been diagnosed in him.

At the March 20, 2037, premiere of ‘’I Am Still Me’‘, the crowd and simultaneous requests for his attention overwhelmed Julian. Kayla helped him leave the public lobby, and he reached a private restroom before vomiting. She stayed with him and secured the door when he asked about it. Afterward, Julian remained slightly shaky but felt better and was able to join the Lee family in the green room.

Julian used prescribed, as-needed anti-anxiety medication that he called his “panic button.” Before the premiere screening, he took it and allowed himself to doze in the green room while Minjae slept nearby and the others spoke quietly. Julian arranged for Kayla to wake him before they needed to enter the theater because he wanted to participate in opening night.

The final production workload had severely curtailed Julian’s sleep before the premiere; his nap at home before leaving for the venue was his first substantial nap in days. After taking his anxiety medication and resting, he managed the screening and celebrations emotionally well despite exhaustion. His grief over Zeek missing the occasion surfaced after he and Kayla returned home. Julian went to change into his soft pajamas while Kayla took out the trash. On returning, she heard him sobbing from the bedroom doorway and found him holding a program, struggling to catch his breath.

Cultural Identity and Communication

Julian was Puerto Rican American, born and raised on the mainland with family roots in Puerto Rico. English was his dominant everyday language; Spanish surfaced more readily in family settings and in moments of stress, tenderness, or illness. A faint Puerto Rican lilt could emerge in his English when he was tired or emotional, though most listeners heard a generally American accent.

He spoke in a low, soft, deliberate voice with a slight persistent rasp, sharpened by reflux and repeated vomiting. The hoarseness deepened or his voice cracked when he was tired or recovering from an episode. When nervous, words could catch in his throat. He sometimes talked in his sleep, slurring emotional fragments as he drifted off. He listened closely and tended to process his own feelings later, in private. His quietness was not passivity: he spoke when something mattered and could be precise or quietly funny. His documentary work emphasized allowing disabled subjects to represent the full range of their lives rather than reducing them to either suffering or inspiration.

Physical Characteristics and Personal Style

Julian stood around five feet seven to five feet eight, with a thin, wiry build and a posture that drew inward when he was nervous or overstimulated. He had warm medium-brown skin, a slender jaw and prominent cheekbones, large dark expressive eyes, and dark loose curls or waves that often fell into his face. His features could look almost boyish when he was rested, but exhaustion and pain left him hollow-eyed. His hands were bony and often cool, with a slight tremor; he frequently fiddled with camera straps, pen caps, or his sleeves.

He favored neutral colors, soft fabrics, and slightly loose clothing: hoodies, worn jeans, canvas jackets, and flannel shirts over T-shirts. The choices accommodated his sensory sensitivities and kept him comfortable through illness, but he generally looked neat. He smelled faintly of coffee and clean laundry, sometimes with menthol or antiseptic during a health flare.

Family and Core Relationships

Ezekiel, Ashley, and Family of Origin

Main article: Megan Ashley Alvarez

Main article: Zeek Reyes

Main article: Zeek Reyes and Megan Ashley Alvarez

Main article: Julian Reyes and Megan Ashley Alvarez

Main article: Julian Reyes and Zeek Reyes

Main article: Julian Reyes and Ruben Alvarez

Main article: Zeek Reyes’s Microcassette Archive

Julian’s parents were Ezekiel “Zeek” Reyes and Megan Ashley “Ash” Alvarez, who had known each other since sixth grade. Zeek became a father at seventeen, provided most of Julian’s care, and raised him largely on his own in a small studio apartment in Fresno. He called Julian his “lil man” and cared for his persistent reflux and other infant health difficulties.

Ashley had been diagnosed with bipolar I disorder as a teenager after a three-day disappearance, medical crisis, and mixed episode shortly before Julian’s conception. After learning that she was pregnant, she returned to inpatient care because she feared for Julian’s safety. Convinced that she had killed the baby, she sobbed, moaned in panic, and begged clinicians to detox her regardless of what it took. At thirty-eight weeks, late-pregnancy hormonal changes and painful contractions sometimes led her to say things she did not mean; those statements did not reflect resentment toward Julian, who was her world. After his birth, she experienced a postpartum bipolar episode with psychotic features. Her symptoms began before the final crisis and culminated when she stepped into oncoming traffic at seventeen, when Julian was three months old and at daycare. Zeek died at twenty, approaching his twenty-first birthday, when Julian was nearly three. Police responding to a welfare check found Julian in his crib and Zeek unresponsive in bed.

Julian’s maternal grandfather, Ruben Alvarez, did not become his primary caregiver after Zeek’s death. Ruben’s obstructive hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and recurrent syncope had already forced him out of UPS delivery work because driving and sustained physical labor were unsafe, and his impaired exertional capacity left him unable to provide safe sole care for a toddler. Ruben’s depression had also worsened after Ashley’s death. At the time of Zeek’s death, Julian’s maternal aunt Amy Alvarez was approximately eighteen and was terrified of leaving Ruben alone; his maternal uncle Jack Alvarez was approximately fifteen and checked on Ruben repeatedly. Ruben’s inability to take Julian did not reflect a lack of love for him or indifference to what happened after Zeek died.

Zeek’s father remained angry at Ruben for opposing Zeek’s expulsion. After Zeek died, he and Zeek’s older brother Marco used their control over Julian’s upbringing and access to keep the Alvarez family away from him. Ruben was disabled, grieving, and financially unable to sustain a fight against that exclusion.

Julian learned the circumstances of his parents’ crises through news coverage. Ashley’s entry into traffic had attracted substantial coverage, and the coverage Julian encountered focused on what she had done. Public discussion often treated Ashley cruelly while omitting the context of her age, illness, fear during pregnancy, and love for Julian. He was not wary of her and grieved her death, but his feelings toward her were more muted and difficult to access than his feelings toward Zeek because public accounts were his primary access to her. Zeek’s later death prompted renewed attention to the same family. The reporting Julian found described Zeek being found dead with the cause unknown; it gave Julian an account of the welfare check and his discovery without explaining why his father died. Julian remained protective of both parents.

During an extended absence connected to the production and release of ‘’I Am Still Me’‘, an unidentified person left a large unmarked box at Julian and Kayla’s Los Angeles apartment without using a delivery carrier. Miss Shirley discovered it and had her grandsons move it inside. The discovery and the public backlash surrounding the film triggered Julian’s fear that someone had located their home and left something dangerous, and he declined to have the box forwarded to Baltimore. It contained Zeek’s microcassette archive inside a locked safe that opened with Julian’s birthdate. Zeek had written “for Julian” on the inner package and “his bday” beneath the safe, but Julian did not initially recognize his father’s handwriting because he had never seen it. The notebooks inside allowed him to identify it. The collection included Zeek’s recorder and tapes, health notes, drawings, photographs, and a written assurance that Julian’s mami had loved him with everything she had. Zeek told Julian that Ashley’s illness, her panic during pregnancy, and things she said in late-pregnancy pain had not diminished her love for him. That clarification changed Julian’s understanding of Ashley. Photographs Zeek had taken and saved of Ashley with Julian helped him understand what the words meant; Zeek had kept them without knowing that his son would later need them to see his mother outside the public account of her death. The person who preserved and dropped off the archive was not immediately known.

Julian particularly treasured accidental recordings of Zeek sleeping and snoring because they preserved unguarded stretches of his father alive at home. Other tapes recorded Zeek talking from loneliness, addressing Julian, speaking about Ashley, or experiencing health episodes he had not intended to preserve.

On March 20, 2037, before Julian had reestablished contact with the Alvarez family, Ruben, Amy, and Jack watched the livestream of the ‘’I Am Still Me’’ premiere from Ruben’s Fresno home. They watched the documentary and the interviews with Julian that followed.

After the premiere, Julian’s maternal aunt Amy emailed Resonance Films, but her message was buried in the company’s general inbox. Nearly two months later, while examining Zeek’s archive and recovering from the film’s release, Julian found the email and replied. He asked to begin corresponding by email and asked whether Ruben was okay. Several weeks later, Kayla drove Julian from Los Angeles to Ruben’s Fresno home for his first remembered meeting with the Alvarez family. Julian took his prescribed as-needed anti-anxiety medication and slept during the drive. Ruben gave him the information the medical examiner had released after Zeek’s death. It did not identify a definitive cause or resolve whether an arrhythmia or aspiration killed Zeek. Julian bonded with the Alvarez family and became especially close to Ruben, whom he loved dearly.

Julian’s own memories of Zeek were vague, but recalling them consistently brought him to tears. As an adult, he sometimes sobbed over photographs of himself with his father and could not explain the intensity of his grief. He missed Zeek deeply while judging it stupid to miss someone he believed he had barely known. Kayla rejected that judgment and affirmed his right to miss his father without requiring clearer memories or an explanation for his tears.

Julian’s paternal grandfather, who had also abused Zeek, emotionally and sexually abused Julian. Marco, Zeek’s older brother and Julian’s paternal uncle, was complicit and also participated in the emotional abuse. These experiences contributed to Julian’s reluctance to disclose the depth of his love and grief for his father. He had only spoken fully about those feelings to Kayla, making her one of the few people who understood how much he loved and missed Zeek.

Both Zeek and Julian were told they “weren’t man enough”. The family’s attacks on their masculinity formed part of the emotional abuse each experienced. As an adult, Julian remained reluctant to admit fatigue or ask for rest, including with Kayla, because he feared that needing either would confirm the family’s judgment of his masculinity.

Julian had powerful intuition and suspected that his grandfather and uncle had also abused Zeek. He expressed his reasoning as “abusers rarely abuse just one person”. He had not learned Zeek’s abuse history, so his suspicion remained distinct from confirmed knowledge.

Jack Alvarez

Main article: Julian Reyes and Jack Alvarez

Julian’s maternal uncle Jack spent time with him when he was an infant, before Julian’s paternal family cut off the Alvarez family’s access. They reconnected during Julian’s first remembered visit to Ruben’s home in 2037 and became very close. Julian gravitated toward Jack and later texted him about an unresolved work concern while preparing to interview Simon Reed for Resonance Films.

Kayla Rossi

Main article: Julian Reyes and Kayla Rossi

Julian and Kayla had known each other since high school and began dating a few months before production of ‘’I Am Still Me’‘. She was the person he looked for when he came back from a seizure and one of the few people with whom he felt safe enough to reveal his fear and grief. He sometimes worried that his illness would make him too difficult to love; Kayla stayed with him through seizures, vomiting episodes, and periods when he doubted whether he could keep making films. He noticed her needs just as closely. Despite their limited money, he replaced her favorite Lush shampoo or body scrub when she ran out and made sure she had clothes in which she felt confident. Once, he said he was going to the pharmacy for his Zofran and also stopped for her citrus shampoo. They co-founded Resonance Films, where Kayla served as producer and field coordinator alongside Julian’s direction and editing.

Minjae Lee

Main article: Julian Reyes and Minjae Lee

Minjae was the subject of Julian’s most prominent film. Their relationship continued beyond production, and Minjae regarded Julian and Kayla as his “movie friends.”

Isabela Rossi and Miss Shirley

Isabela “Izzy” Rossi, Kayla’s older sister, treated Julian as a younger brother and called him JR. Miss Shirley, Julian and Kayla’s older neighbor, called them her “sudokids” and brought him coconut-banana-flax muffins that were easier on his stomach during difficult health periods. After watching the livestream of his documentary premiere, she waited with muffins for Julian and Kayla to come home.

Memorable Quotes

“This one’s gonna break me.”

Julian spoke after the final day of filming with Minjae.

“He’s not tragic. Just real. Brilliant. Funny. A husband. A musician. A person.”

Julian answered a reporter’s question at the documentary premiere.

“You’re perfect, just like this.”

Julian reassured Minjae during filming.

“Did good, right? For him?”

Julian asked Kayla after the premiere.

Characters Supporting Characters Living Characters Filmmakers Disabled Characters Chronic Illness Characters Neurodivergent Characters Autistic Characters Latinx Characters Puerto Rican Characters