Aquaman (2018)

Poster Description: In keeping with the DCEU’s obsession with sunrises on their posters, the sun hits sand and waves created by Arthur/Aquaman (Momoa) and Mera (Heard). They stand together with the ocean up to their waists. Arthur’s golden trident glints mysteriously, matching his scaly bodysuit, while Mera has bright red hair and a gold tiara. In addition, she wears a blue and green catsuit. They both look incredibly serious, indeed.

During my research for Zack Snyder’s Justice League, I realised two things:

1) The Flash still needs a film of his own. Luckily, it’s coming out later this year.

2) I remember very little about Aquaman.

However, after finally watching it again, I understood why.

For all his masculine bravado, Arthur (Momoa, Dune) grapples with his identity. Born from a queen of Atlantis and a human lighthouse-keeper, he spends his time rescuing submarines from pirates and getting hammered in bars. With his dad. Is he lonely? It’s just as well that Mera (Heard, Machete Kills) has arrived on land to get Arthur to claim his birthright. As the first-born son of Queen Atlanna (Nicole Kidman, Bombshell), he is the rightful king. Unfortunately, Atlanna’s other son Orm (Patrick Wilson, The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It) is on the throne, hankering to destroy all who dwell on the land and pollute the ocean.

The overall tone wrestles with being deep and profound and being a quirky little adventure. The environmental message is a bit ham-fisted, delivered via the so-called villain. You can see where Orm is coming from; unfortunately, Wilson lacks the charisma to make Orm an engaging anti-hero. In addition, his bizarre decision to have “AHHHHH,” as a battle-cry, and awkwardly elongating Atlantis’s name, makes you wonder if he understood the film’s mood either.

On the other hand, Momoa rolls with the disjointed punches. Though solitary and churlish on the surface (which we saw in both versions of Justice League, for better or for worse), Arthur’s dry sense of humour won me over as soon as he crashed down into a Russian submarine. No other reason. Nope. None at all.

GIF Description: Arthur stands in a dimly lit submarine, surrounded by monitors with many switches and buttons. His hair is wet down his back, which is covered in dark, scaly tattoos that continue down his arms. Looking over his large shoulder, Arthur smirks with a raised eyebrow. Then, he mouths, “Permission to come aboard?” and it's written in white subtitles below him.

Makes one wonder what a female director would have made out of that whole sequence (sorry, James Wan).

The Atlantean suits look clunky, but none so much as the film’s secondary villain, Black Manta (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, The Matrix Resurrections). We meet him on the submarine, as mentioned earlier, a pirate with his dear old dad. Aquaman is all about father-child dynamics but fails to explore it properly at every opportunity. Arthur’s dad, Tom (Temuera Morrison, The Book of Boba Fett), barely scrapes thirty minutes of screen-time, and Willem Dafoe’s Vulko only appears when Arthur needs a pep-talk. As for Manta, his father signs his life away as soon as he gives his son his favourite knife. Here’s where it gets vaguely interesting. After rescuing the Russian soldiers from said pirates, Arthur has the option to save everyone from the sinking sub…but he doesn’t. So begins Black Manta’s story, complete with a costume that looks like it came straight out of Power Rangers. While it’s true to the comics, I cannot take it seriously. Fortunately, Abdul-Mateen is suitably menacing without that ridiculous helmet.

Image Description: (Left) A screenshot of an Aquaman comic front cover. The yellow title is defaced by black letters, spelling out BLACK MANTA #1. The villain has sliced Aquaman with his dagger in a tornado of blood. The hero flails behind Black Manta, his trident crackling underwater. (Right) A Black Manta character poster from the film. He wears a black, bulky suit and a curved helmet with bulbous red eyes – is this a manta or mantis? He holds a small sword, surrounded by seawater in a submarine.

Amber Heard reprises her role as Mera. Besides her shocking red hair and ability to manipulate water (and, in a particularly fun sequence, wine), she’s a pretty bland character, frequently stating the obvious and – yawn – becoming Arthur’s love interest. But, of course, isn’t that all women are for?

GIF Description: Though the GIF has no audio, you can almost hear Mera’s roar as she swoops her arms up. Blue light emanates from her hands, and red wine swirls around her, shaping into deadly spikes.

Well, the only other female character is his mother, and Nicole Kidman deserves more than this; her big reveal is overshadowed by another Jules Verne reference. Indeed, there are many mentions of Verne, and H.P. Lovecraft's, work. The film opens with a quote from Verne, and Lovecraft wrote extensively about Atlantis and impossibly giant monsters; Aquaman features a deep-sea creature named Karathen, voiced by Dame Julie Andrews.

Dame. Julie. Andrews.

The film was available to watch in 3D upon its cinematic release, and it shows: Atlantis is a CGI fest, swinging between a glorious spectacle for the eyes and an absolute mess. The use of humpback whales offers impressive perspective for the city’s size, though that octopus playing the drums was a wasted blink-and-you’ll-miss-it gag. Also, poor Djimon Hounsou’s character design is utterly hideous.

Image Description: We’re in Atlantis, the water is blue, and the architecture is elaborate and silver. With a guard behind him, King Ricou (Hounsou) has green scaly skin with a tall fin on top of his head and around his jaw and neck. His eyes are pitted, his expression sombre with a vast chin. His golden armour, including his trident, looks more ceremonial than practical, with many gaps.

As a stand-alone film, Aquaman offers very little that hasn’t been done before, relying on intense CGI and shameless eye-candy to keep audiences invested. While Momoa is good for the female gaze, the screenplay writers don’t seem to know what to do with their female characters. With two villains muddying the waters (pun intended) and the plot going through the motions, it is one of the more forgettable DCEU films. Let’s hope the sequel offers something better, eh?

The Verdict: 2 STARS OUT OF 5

My Sources:

Aquaman film poster/cast: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1477834/

Jason Momoa filmography: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jason_Momoa#Film

Amber Heard filmography: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1720028/?ref_=tt_ov_st

Temuera Morrison filmography: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0607325/?ref_=tt_cl_t_8

GIF – Arthur enters the submarine: https://gfycat.com/gifs/search/aquaman+submarine+scene

Image – Black Manta (comics and film): https://nerdist.com/article/aquaman-costumes-comics/

GIF – Mera turns wine into a weapon: https://www.fanforum.com/f88/mera-%E2%99%A5-arthur-aquaman-2-so-what-do-i-do-now-their-king-63227022/

The Karathen is Dame Julie Andrews?! https://www.wmagazine.com/story/julie-andrews-aquaman

What’s the name of Djimon Hounsou’s character? https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0005023/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

Image – Djimon Hounsou is King Ricou: https://collider.com/aquaman-image-fisherman-king/