After decades of getting treated like a pop culture punchline, thanks almost entirely to “Super Friends” (with a little help from “Entourage”), Aquaman finally has his own feature film. It’s a weird and wonderful superhero adventure that strives — and almost succeeds — to be the most epic superhero movie ever made.
Directed by James Wan (“Furious 7”), “Aquaman” ventures from a neon, “Tron”-inspired Atlantis to ancient ruins straight out of “Indiana Jones,” and then into a nightmare realm of evil swarming fish monsters. It features gigantic battles between innocent crab people and bad guys riding armored sharks. At one point, a DayGlo rave octopus plays the drums while Aquaman fights for the throne of Atlantis in an underwater gladiator arena called “The Ring of Fire.”
To call this movie “big” is an understatement. “Aquaman” has damn near everything: Amber Heard wears a dress made out of domesticated jellyfish, Julie Andrews voices a Lovecraftian aquatic leviathan, Nicole Kidman eats a live goldfish (presumably fake), Willem Dafoe spins a trident so fast it creates an impenetrable saltwater shield.
Watch Video: 'Aquaman' Dons His Classic Outfit in Final Trailer
At the center of it all is Jason Momoa, who plays Aquaman (a.k.a. Arthur Curry) like a shirtless, beer-swilling underachiever. Ever since his mom, Princess Atlanna (Kidman), was executed for falling in love with a human and having a hybrid child, Arthur has deemed himself unworthy of just about anything. It took a whole “Justice League” movie to get him to start acting like a superhero, and it’ll take a whole “Aquaman” movie to make him finally accept his mantle as the King of Atlantis.
Until then, Arthur’s half-brother Orm (Patrick Wilson) has the throne, and he’s using that power to assemble all of the undersea armies and to prepare a massive war against the surface-dwellers. In order to stop him, Arthur will have to team up with Mera (Heard), a princess from another kingdom, and find a fabled trident which, like Excalibur, can be wielded only by the one true king.
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Easier said than done. Their globe-trotting journey will take them from the depths of the ocean to the Saharan desert and beyond. It’s a simple plot, but it’s sturdy enough, and Wan hangs a heck of a lot of action and opulence on it. We’ve come a long way from the slow scuba-diving “thrills” of “Thunderball.” The underwater fights in “Aquaman” are fast, furious, and take advantage of unusual surroundings for gyroscopic choreography where warriors can twist in any direction on the fly and zoom at their opponents like a rocket.
“Aquaman” isn’t like most other superhero movies. Our hero doesn’t spend much time in a recognizable world. Instead, he explores fantastical domains that seem straight out of the imagination of Robert E. Howard, which sets the film firmly in a related, but separate literary tradition. Wan’s “Aquaman” is pulp, through and through, and it’s as broad and outlandish as you could possibly hope for.
The cast, mostly, seems to be on board with that aesthetic. Momoa knows he’s playing a dashing megahunk. His first scene features an introductory hair whip straight out of “Gilda.” Heard is playing the Dejah Thoris role, even more heroic and capable than our protagonist. Wilson seems to have stepped straight out of John Boorman’s “Excalibur,” and Dafoe… actually, Willem Dafoe looks like he got lost on his way to a “Life Aquatic” reunion. He might be a little too weird an actor to play the straightforward role he’s got, as the king’s vizier and Aquaman’s swimming instructor.
Watch Video: 'Aquaman' Jason Momoa Killed a Guy With a Trident on 'The Tonight Show'
There are other moments in which “Aquaman,” for all the slack we’re willing to cut it, strains credulity. At one point, when our heroes arrive in Africa, the soundtrack plays a remix of Toto’s “Africa,” which might make your eyes might roll all the way into the next theater. Also, Mera is pretty talented with a woodwind instrument for a character who’s hardly ever left the ocean. And one of the villains, Black Manta (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, “The Get Down”) receives a perfectly functional superweapon from King Orm and then gets his own montage as he transforms it into something infinitely more likely to make his own head explode, as if that somehow makes him look smarter or cooler.
Wan’s film pushes too far sometimes, but that’s because it’s pushing as hard as it can. “Aquaman” does nothing by halves, ultimately reaping the rewards and occasionally suffering some consequences. Those aren’t bugs, they’re features. Wan seems to be operating under the philosophy that sci-fi/fantasy should stretch the limits of the imagination, even at the cost of possibly looking ludicrous. How much you personally agree with that philosophy will probably have a lot to do with whether or not you like “Aquaman.”
But either way, you’re in for a spectacle. “Aquaman” has been designed with the IMAX aspect ratio in mind, and Wan knows how to fill that frame. The fantastical set designs are brimming with detail, and the scenes where Arthur and Mera are frantically swimming away from a horde of killer ichthyoid monstrosities play with negative space, creating a sense of overwhelming, beautiful hopelessness. It’s a world where anything can happen, and it always looks amazing when it does.
“Aquaman” is a sword-and-sorcery sci-fi archaeology horror war superhero epic without shame. But why would it have shame? James Wan dives into the strangest caverns of DC’s vast mythologies and brings it all to the big screen, challenging you to accept just how unusual superhero stories can be.
Every DC Comics Movie Ranked From Worst to Best, Including 'Justice League'
The DC Comics universe hasn't flooded the big screen quite the way Marvel ones have, but the DC brand has been hitting the big screen longer in the modern era. We ranked all those modern flicks, from "Superman: The Movie" to "Wonder Woman" and "Justice League."
32. "Jonah Hex" (2010)
Despite the efforts of Josh Brolin and Michael Fassbender, this is one of the worst comic book movies of the modern era.
31. "Superman IV: The Quest for Peace" (1987)
Christopher Reeve is by far the best Superman. But "Superman IV" is a bomb in every sense -- partly because of its heavy-handedness about bombs. Nuclear bombs. The film finds Superman trying to eliminate the world's nuclear threat, but his best intentions run afoul of a silly, badly dated villain named Nuclear Man.
30. "Supergirl" (1984)
We had a female-superhero movie in 1984, and it was pure cheese. But hey, at least they tried. The best thing I can say about it is there are worse things in life than this movie.
28. "Steel" (1997)
Best known as "the one Shaq was in back when he tried acting," "Steel" is pretty bad. But the fun kind of bad.
27. "Justice League"
Warner Bros has continued to innovate in how to make bad DCEU movies, with "Justice League" managing to be terrible in a totally different way from "Batman v Superman" and "Suicide Squad."
26. "Man of Steel" (2013)
Could have been worse, I guess. But it's still morally gross and has a plot that doesn't make sense. That it's very pretty to look at doesn't override those things nearly enough to make it watchable.
25. "Catwoman" (2004)
Thoroughly horrible, but somehow amusing even so. Sad that it's seemingly been swept into the litter box of history.
24. "Batman & Robin" (1997)
Rightly hated, but it's tremendously entertaining here and there. Uma Thurman and Arnold Schwarzeneggar are going so far over the top I can't help but admire them.
23. "Superman III" (1983)
Featured a brilliant corporate rip-off -- one later referenced in "Office Space" -- but the attempt to funny things up with the addition of Richard Pryor didn't gel. There was also a weird bit about a weather satellite creating bad weather, which isn't what weather satellites do. Seeing Clark Kent fight Superman was pretty cool, though.
22. "Green Lantern" (2011)
Overreliance on cartoony visual effects during a period when big blockbusters were moving away from that aesthetic meant this was a movie nobody liked. Not that it was especially horrible. It just looked like a dumb cartoon and is hard to watch.
21. "The Dark Knight Rises" (2012)
Probably wasn't intended to be a grim and gritty Shumacher Batmovie, but that is indeed what it is. This is Nolan going full Hollywood, smashing plot points into place by sheer force of will rather than because they make sense. An extremely theatrical Tom Hardy as Bane is amusing front to back, and a nuke with a countdown clock on it will never get old.
20. "Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice" (2016)
A total mess that hates Superman and turns Batman into a total maniac. None of those things are good. Ben Affleck can't save the thing, but he's excellent nonetheless and gives it a huge bump it probably doesn't deserve.
19. "Watchmen" (2009)
I have no particular affection for the revered "Watchmen" comic the way a lot of other nerds do, so my distaste for this adaptation isn't personal. It just doesn't add up to nearly as much as it thinks it does.
18. "Batman" (1989)
Fondly remembered mostly because it was the first Batmovie in a couple decades. It isn't actually very good, though. The reveal that a younger version of the Joker killed Bruce Wayne's parents is as hamfistedly dumb as it gets in a "Batman" movie.
17. "V for Vendetta" (2006)
Felt nothing watching this. I tried, OK. It's impeccably made, though, and very watchable.
15. "Batman v Superman Ultimate Edition" (2016)
Giving this its own slot because it fundamentally changes the narrative of the movie and the character of Superman in the DC Extended Universe. This version is still not great (especially at three freaking hours), but it's a monumental improvement over the theatrical version.
14. "Red 2" (2013)
Did you even know these were comic book movies? Whatever, it's a great cast in a serviceable action movie and everybody's having a good time. Hard to remember, but fun.
13. "Red" (2010)
Better than its sequel, but they're basically the same.
12. "The Dark Knight" (2008)
Should be way shorter, but Heath Ledger's Joker is far and away the best villain in any of these movies. Ledger elevates what would otherwise be just another self-indulgent Christopher Nolan exercise into an endlessly watchable picture.
11. "Batman Forever" (1995)
Hits just the right tone for what Joel Shumacher was trying to do with the two films he directed. Tommy Lee Jones, as Two Face, is doing stuff in this movie that is hard to believe even today, given his perpetual sour face in nearly every other movie he's been in.
10. "Superman Returns" (2006)
Actually a pretty decent attempt by Bryan Singer to do a Christopher Reeve "Superman" movie in the present day, but Brandon Routh couldn't pull off the charisma it takes to be the Man of Steel. It was his first movie, so that's not surprising. But it's a shame, because Routh has gotten much better in the years since.
9. "Batman: Mask of the Phantasm" (1993)
Remember that time they released a "Batman" cartoon theatrically? It gets lost amongst all the live-action ones, but "Mask of the Phantasm" is better than most of them.
8. "The LEGO Batman Movie" (2017)
Funny, sweet and self-deprecating -- exactly what we needed in the wake of the disaster that was "Batman v Superman."
7. "Superman II" (1980)
Made kids everywhere cry as they watched Superman give up his powers for a normal life with Lois Lane (Margot Kidder). There are different edits of this movie, and we frankly can't keep them straight. But the sight of a powerless Clark getting beat up in a diner made Superman as sympathetic as he's ever been.
6. "Wonder Woman" (2017)
Has the standard origin movie problem of "too much story, not enough time." And the standard DC Extended Universe problem of "We gotta have a nonsensical CGI battle at the end." But despite those caveats it's an enormous delight, and a big step forward for the DCEU.
5. "Batman Returns" (1992)
One of the best of the franchise because it's really just a political thriller. The Penguin emerges from the sewer and runs for mayor of Gotham! It's great stuff, especially as we continue to watch the rise of Trump in our world.
4. "Constantine" (2005)
A happy balance of serious and ridiculous, manages to find exactly the right tone for this weird religious fantasy and a cast led by Keanu Reeves. They all seem to get it.
3. "Superman: The Movie" (1978)
This is the gold standard of Superman movies, and was the best superhero movie bar none for many, many years. John Williams' score soars, and so does the believable and compelling romance between Superman and Lois Lane. The film convincingly blended camp (in the form of Gene Hackman's wonderful Lex Luthor), an epic origin story that actually felt epic, and funny lines. The scene in which Supes and Lois fly together is one of the most beautiful metaphors for new love ever captured on film.
2. "Batman: The Movie" (1966)
Has a timelessness that none of the other films do, and it's just a delight from beginning to end thanks to Adam West's winking Batman and the coalition of villains who can't stop cackling maniacally. Watching it again recently, I found it functions almost perfectly as a parody of the super-serious Christopher Nolan Batfilms, which is incredible.
1. "Batman Begins" (2005)
The most complete film, on its own, in the entire live-action franchise. It's just, like, a regular movie... except it's about Batman. It has actual characters and everything, and Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne even has emotions. It's weird.
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