She may just be 20 years old,
but Isabela Merced is already a huge star,
and her career is just getting started.
To celebrate her star turn in Netflix's Sweet Girl,
let's take a look at the roles that got her here,
in her Road to Netflix...
The acting bug hit Isabela from a young age,
making her Broadway debut at just 10 years old
in a production of Evita, alongside Ricky Martin.
Her TV acting career began picking up steam in 2013,
when she had a recurring role
in NBC's family sitcom, Growing Up Fisher.
Your dad didn't tell you?
My mum's out of town for work
so I'm going to Catalina with you guys.
And in 2014, she had a recurring voice role
on Dora and Friends: Into the City!
A sequel to the original children's series.
I'm Kate and these are my friends, Dora and Pablo.
But her breakthrough role came in 2014,
on Nickelodeon's 100 Things to Do Before High School,
where she played middle schooler CJ Martin,
who, along with her two best friends,
makes a bucket list filled with things
to accomplish before high school.
I just want to say,
I am not proud of what I'm about to do.
She also appeared in other Nickelodeon productions,
including 2015's Splitting Adam
and 2016's Legends of the Hidden Temple.
This is a restricted area, I'm putting my foot down.
Also that year, she played
the super-smart president of a middle school AV club,
Gene, in Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life,
an adaptation of the 2011 novel of the same name.
I just love that someone has the guts
to take on the establishment.
By 2017, Isabela was on the big screen
in the fifth instalment
of the Transformers film series,
alongside Mark Wahlberg
and fellow Netflix alum, Laura Haddock.
Her character, Izabella with a Z,
is a young orphaned scavenger on Earth,
whose only companions are two autobots.
I want to stay and I want to fight them.
Transformers director, Michael Bay, gave her
the opportunity to add a few Spanish words to her part,
after hearing her speak Spanish
with her mother on set.
That year was definitely busy for her.
She also appeared in the hugely popular
Kingdom Hearts series,
voicing Ava in the English dub.
And what's written in the book...
all of it will happen.
2018's Sicario: Day of the Soldado
brought a meteor role and change in genre
to Isabela's resume,
when she played the daughter of a drug kingpin
in the action crime sequel.
I know who you are.
You're the attorney whose family they killed.
Her character, Isabel, is captured by a CIA team
aiming to start a war between drug cartels
on the US/Mexico border.
She was reunited with Mark Wahlberg
in 2018's Instant Family, a comedy drama
where a couple decide to adopt three siblings.
Isabela played 15-year-old Izzy, the eldest sibling,
who is initially not on board
with the whole adoption thing.
Just let me talk to her, please,
and then we can figure something out and...
-Honey… -...she can take me home.
Remember how Isabela had a voice role
in the Dora series?
Well, she stepped it up in 2019 by taking on
the lead role in the live action version,
Dora and the Lost City of Gold,
playing a grown-up version
of the iconic children's character.
The movie sees Dora head to high school,
a far cry from her explorer roots.
That is until she and her friends are captured
by mercenaries trying to steal treasures in Peru.
Oh, and there's another
Mark Wahlberg connection here.
His nephew Jeff Wahlberg play Diego in the film.
Cousin Diego! You're so skinny and tall!
You are way more energetic than I remember.
Her first appearance on a Netflix Original
also came that year
in the Christmas romcom, Let It Snow.
Snow hides a lot
It's like the space of weather.
You can do a lot worse than this place, trust me.
Isabela's character Julie is a girl
who has a scholarship to Columbia,
but feels like she can't leave her mother,
who is ill.
She and a rising pop star
strike up a will they-won't they romance
when they meet on a train which get stopped
by snowed over tracks.
That brings us to 2021,
when she made a return to voice acting,
in Dreamworks Animation's Spirit Untamed.
I'm going to call you Spirit.
And of course she stars alongside Jason Momoa
in Netflix's Sweet Girl.
This is a tale of a man and his daughter
versus some shady pharmaceutical companies.
Ray, played by Jason, is devastated
when his wife dies of terminal cancer,
shortly after a life-saving drug
is pulled from the market.
But his quest for revenge on the company responsible
lands him and his daughter, played by Isabela,
in a whole load of trouble.
Dad!
And Isabela's Rachel isn't taking any
of this lying down.
I know you're fighting for us.
But this is my fight too.
She joins her father in the fight for justice.
And what happens next?
Well, you'll have to catch Sweet Girl,
now streaming on Netflix.
And for more on your favourite Netflix stars,
make sure you subscribe to the channel.