AQUAMAN: King of Atlantis!

 Yes I know, He's the guy that talks to fish and has a pretty bad reputation for being quite silly and boring. What better way to change this opinion than casting Game of Thrones badass Jason Momoa! DC are giving the character a place in a team up movie and his own solo flick, cementing him as a big player in the DCEU. 'Justice League' is set to release in November. However after Justice League, Aquaman's solo movie is next up and it could possibly be the most exciting of all! While there may be only *very mild spoilers* this week, there whale be puns. Ahoy! No wait I meant Enjoy!

Aquaman is mostly shown in his comics as the king of the underwater location of Atlantis. In the comics, Atlantis was shown as a location of earth where early civilisations of humans lived and this was around the time that dinosaurs existed. Eventually, a dome was built over Atlantis, establishing it as a well fortified kingdom. This was until a meteor struck earth, drove the dinosaurs to extinction and pushed Atlantis completley underwater. Usually through some sort of magic or act of the gods, those who survived the meteor developed the ability to survive underwater. Over the years they repopulated Atlantis and built underwater palaces, formed social structures and became a complete underwater civilisation. Queen Atlanna of Atlantis, in most of the origins tends to always get banished or for some reason find herself in a sea storm which leads to her being in danger but rescued by lighthouse keeper, Thomas Curry. Atlanna and Tom form a relationship and have a child named Arthur Curry. Arthur Curry grows up on both land and underwater being a hybrid of the two worlds. Nearly all of Arthur's origins include him leaving land in search for his true destiny in Atlantis which is being the king, ruler and defender of the underwater kingdom. Although his role requires putting Atlantis first, growing up on land leads Arthur to defending both land and sea in search of harmony between the two worlds. He takes up the title of 'Aquaman: King of Atlantis' having super strength on land, being able to control water, communicate with sea creatures and much more. He is also known for his weapon of choice, the trident which is passed down through Atlantis royalty and holds many abilities.

Now that you know who Aquaman really is, let's talk about why his movie, set for a 2018 release, is super super exciting! DC and Warner Bros. have decided to ditch the blue eyed, all American, blonde haired cliche for Jason Momoa. The Hawaii born actor with his recognisable hair, beard, and eyebrow slit is most well known for playing Khal Drogo, a warlord of the Dothraki people on HBO's game of Thrones. He's huge (6ft 4in) and intimidating let alone a total real life badass who's obsessed with guinness and is able to accurately throw axes. As you can sea from his picture below, being the fearless leader of an underwater kingdom strong enough to take on Superman isn't that far fetched to believe. He's just so dam cool. Anywaves, another reason why you should be excited, is the prospect of seeing an entirely new kind of environment on the big screen! We've seen new planets before (Krypton) and we've seen abstract locations (Themyscira), but we have never seen a movie about a superhero who's home is entirely underwater. The director has confirmed the movie will not shy away from Atlantis which means the majority of the movie will be focusing on underwater civilians, armies, villains, monsters and buildings. It will be like nothing we have ever seen before.

If that's not enough to get you excited, how about the director, James Wan. The specialist horror director, known for movies such as Saw, The Conjuring, Anabelle and Insidious, has been given the oppor-tuna-ty to direct the genre defying solo movie of a justice league founding member. Briefly speaking about the movie, he has been very clear that his experience in making horror will play into his ideas for Aquaman. To be more pacific, Wan is keen to explore the darkness and monsters of the deep sea, something which has never been explored before in a superhero setting. He also assured fans that the movie will entail some jump scares so you can wave that relaxing movie time goodbye because Aquaman will be very intense. Justice League will give us our first look at Aquaman, some of the other characters and possibly even a look at Atlantis in the hopes of it raising interest in the character and that interest will pay off when the Aquaman movie releases.  From what has already been seen in the Justice League trailer, Aquaman seems to be a very gritty and intense character holding the burden of being protector of land and sea. However, he is not absent of humour. If you haven't seen it yet, check out the Justice League trailer here. 

The main cast confirmed so far for Aquaman has Jason Momoa as Aquaman himself, Nicole Kidman

as Queen Atlanna, Amber Heard as Mera, Patrick Wilson as Ocean Master and Yahya Abdul-Manteen II as Black Manta. A very exciting cast list! Amber Heard's character, Mera is Aquaman's wife in the comics and is set to be his big screen partner also. It is unknown whether the movie will be a full origin story as he is already Aquaman in the Justice League however, the movie is likely to contain elements and explanations of the origins. With this being said, we will have to wait and see if Arthur and Mera are together already or if the relationship will form through the characters story arc. Abdul-Manteen's character, Black Manta, will be familiar to DC comic fans. He is Aquamans arch enemy and is sure to cause the big screen version of the character similar trouble to as he does in the comics. I won't say anymore about Black manta with the risk of spoiling possible story elements. The movie is set to release late 2018 but is filming now!

Shorely you're excited for Aquaman now! A great cast, a completely underwater kingdom, a badass lead, and a horror influence. It will be the first ever action superhero horror adventure movie! In a time where superhero movies release practically every month, it can become quite a repetitive experience. A cliche origin movie which follows a standard blueprint in a half hearted attempt to get fans excited for sequels. Aquaman is excusing itself from this rule by adding other genre elements and creating a whole new world. Overall Aqauaman gets a Blog of steel excitement rating of 9/10!

That's the end of this weeks post! Hope you have enjoyed reading it and spotting all the puns! There were 7 in total! If you're excited for Aqauman leave a comment below and tell me why or follow and tweet me  @Akash_Sond. I would love to hear your opinions! Also theres a button on the right side of the page that you can click to follow me on google+ or follow me by email to make sure you never miss a post! See you next week!