Aquaman (2018)
Aquaman arrived in December 2018 at something of a crossroads for the DC Extended Universe. Warner Bros. had spent several years watching Marvel print money while their own interconnected franchise stumbled through mixed-to-hostile receptions for Batman v Superman and Justice League. The pressure on this one was real: Aquaman as a character has long been the butt of superhero jokes, the punchline about the bloke who talks to fish, and turning him into a bankable leading man was always going to be a tall order. To its credit, the film does lean into the sheer scale of Atlantean mythology, presenting an underwater civilisation with its own warring factions, ancient royal bloodlines and ecosystems of frankly bewildering variety. Whether that ambition pays off is, of course, the question. The film pulled in well over a billion dollars at the global box office, making it the highest-grossing DC film at the time of release, which tells you something about audience appetite even if it tells you nothing much about quality.
James Wan is a director whose career trajectory is genuinely interesting. He built his name on lean, resourceful horror, most notably co-creating the Saw franchise before graduating to mainstream action with Furious 7 in 2015, a film that had to carry an enormous amount of emotional baggage and managed it with reasonable grace. Aquaman represents his biggest canvas yet, produced under the DC Films banner with a reported budget north of $160 million, and the film wears that money openly. The screenplay, worked on by David Leslie Johnson-McGoldrick and Will Beall from a story developed alongside Wan himself, draws on decades of comics mythology, particularly the work of writers like Geoff Johns, who had done much to rehabilitate the character in print during the 2000s. It is, on paper at least, a fairly classical quest narrative: a reluctant heir of mixed heritage (human and Atlantean) must prove himself worthy of a throne and prevent a war between worlds. The bones are familiar, which is either reassuring or deflating depending on your tolerance for the formula.
The cast assembled around the central premise is, on paper, impressive. Jason Momoa had already appeared as Arthur Curry in Justice League, and the studio was clearly betting on his physicality and easy charisma carrying the film. Amber Heard plays Mera, the Atlantean warrior who reluctantly becomes Arthur's guide and ally, bringing a polished but unremarkable energy to a role that is written more as a plot function than a person. The supporting roster is where things get genuinely interesting: Willem Dafoe as the royal adviser Vulko, Patrick Wilson as the antagonist Ocean Master, and Nicole Kidman as Arthur's Atlantean mother, all of them performers with serious theatrical pedigrees doing their best to play it straight inside a universe of glowing sea creatures and submarine gladiatorial arenas. There is something both admirable and faintly melancholy about watching actors of that calibre fully commit to material that may or may not deserve them. For fans of the superhero genre looking for a point of comparison in how a rather different comic-book film handles its lead character and world-building, it is worth casting an eye at Macca's review of Spider-Man, which raises some pertinent questions about what separates the genre's better efforts from the merely functional ones.
The modern superhero landscape is a genre that has largely perfected the art of turning your brain off, and James Wan’s 2018 outing Aquaman is a prime example of this phenomenon.
Going in, I was hoping for something that might elevate the formula, perhaps leaning into the sheer, unadulterated absurdity of an underwater kingdom. Instead, I found a film that does absolutely nothing special, coasting entirely on the momentum of the broader comic book machine. It’s loud, it’s flashy, and it entirely fails to leave a lasting impression.
I will say that the film is a visual feast. Wan clearly knows how to stage a massive, CGI-heavy set piece, and the neon-drenched, bioluminescent underwater sequences are undeniably striking to look at. But pretty colours can only do so much heavy lifting when the foundation is this wobbly. The plot is thoroughly mediocre, ticking off predictable beats with zero surprises, and the dialogue is so hammy it frequently borders on the unintentionally comedic. You spend half the runtime waiting for the characters to say something that doesn't sound like it was churned out by a committee of twelve-year-olds.
What makes this all the more frustrating is the sheer waste of talent. Fair play to the supporting cast, because you have absolute legends like Willem Dafoe, Djimon Hounsou, and Temuera Morrison giving it their all. They bring a genuine, grounded gravitas to their roles, trying desperately to anchor the film in some semblance of dramatic weight. However, they are completely let down by the man in the titular role. I’ll be honest: I just don’t "get" Jason Momoa here. His performance feels entirely disconnected from the material, relying on a brooding, muscle-bound schtick that never quite gels with the fantastical world around him.
Aquaman is a perfectly functional, if entirely forgettable, piece of blockbuster cinema. It delivers exactly the kind of mindless, sensory-overload spectacle you’d expect, but it completely lacks the narrative spark or charismatic centre needed to make it truly memorable. Wan has crafted a shiny, hollow shell of a movie that will satisfy those looking for a quick, brainless distraction, but for anyone craving a bit of substance, it’s a massive letdown. It’s a bit of a mess beneath the surface.
A score of two and a half out of five places Aquaman in that particular purgatory reserved for films that are not bad enough to be interesting failures and not good enough to be worth revisiting. It is a film that exists, loudly, for two hours and twenty-three minutes, and then disperses like foam. Wan has since returned to the property with Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom, though that sequel arrived into a franchise already in the process of being formally wound down and rebooted. Whether you remember this first outing fondly probably depends less on the film itself and more on the mood you were in when you saw it. Aquaman set out to prove that even the most ridiculed character in comics could headline a blockbuster. It succeeded at that, just about, though proving a point and making a great film are two very different things. The ocean may be vast, but shallow water is shallow water.
Rating: ★★½ | Year: 2018 | Watched: 2026-07-16
Trailer
▶ Watch the official trailer for Aquaman (2018) on YouTube
Where to watch
Watch in the UK
Stream: HBO Max Amazon Channel · Sky Go · Now TV Cinema · HBO Max
Rent: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies
Buy: Apple TV Store · Rakuten TV · Amazon Video · Google Play Movies
Physical: Amazon UK · Zavvi
Watch in the US
Stream: HBO Max Amazon Channel · YouTube TV · HBO Max
Rent: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Buy: Amazon Video · Apple TV Store · Google Play Movies · YouTube
Physical: Amazon US
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