Review: Aquaman [2018] (Spoiler-Free!)

a review by the Azure-Winged Magpie
^{…AND a special “secret” someone! (But more on that another day…).}

Opening Thoughts

💧__(ಠ ◡ ಠ^✿)

So I watched this yesterday.

You lot know I don’t really like the DCEU. I don’t think Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice was as bad as the Crow said (but it was pretty sh–). And I thought Suicide Squad was a LOT worse than he said.

You lot KNOW what I thought of Justice League and that I thought Wonder Woman was pretty rad (even though I still ain’t reviewed it). Man of Steel was okay though even though it was all grumpy and gloomy.

Here’s how I think the shared universes rank (even though we agree, but because the Crow bored you lot last time with his endless writing, I’m here to list it all up!):

1. GOOD: The Marvel Cinematic Universe
2. GOOD: The Legendary Monsterverse
3. BAD: Clover-verse (he skipped this one, but it kinda counts)
4. BAD: DCExtendedUniverse
5. BAD: Conjuring-verse (he forgot this one)
6. BAD: Dark Universe (ew!)

But here’s the thing. This one’s directed by James Wan. Wan did the films that started off the Conjuring-verse and also made Saw (which I LOVE!). He’s pretty darn good at what he does. So this isn’t going to be another one of those garbo DC films. Right?
…Right?

Let’s see what I thought of this one!

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Waterboy!

WARNING: This section contains MINOR spoilers.

🍿(ಠ ◡ ಠ^✿)

Okay. I hate the backstory already.
I don’t know anything about Aquaman apart from that I heard he can talk to fish. And drown me under a sackful of marmite… this is the cheesiest, boring-est backstory EVER.

Here how it goes: Magic lady Atlanna (NICOLE [BLEEP]-ING KIDMAN!) flops out of the sea and falls in lovey-divers with lighthouse keeper Thomas Curry (Temuera Morrison). A few years later, out pops their kid Arthur (Kaan Guldur) and then she has to go bye-bye! (But not before she leaves him with the Green Goblin Vulko (the Green “Antichrist” Goblin) for some fishy-wishy tuteleageue!

So! The film REALLY starts going when Arthur grows up and becomes…
AQUAMAN (Jason Momoa)…
and he becomes… Aquaman…
and…

(⊙ ◡ ⊙^✿) ^{…oh hello}

and… uhhh right… Right! ^{Focus Magpie! FOCUS!} 
Where uhhh… where was I?

So YEAH! AQUAMAN goes and breaks into a submarine! There’s these people trying to take it over and all. And he breaks into it and SAVES THE DAY! ^{(You can save me any day! Just sayin’!)} BUT! Things go all f– up and before ya know it… one of the baddies bites it! And his little big boy David ain’t none too happy about it. (And that’s as spoiler-ific as I’m getting).

So anyway… Aquaman kinda gets into the know about this BIG WAR that Atlantis is getting ready for against the “SURFACE WORLD” (you humans). And we’ve got our story! Woohoo!

Simba Aquaman has to go back, become tEh r1GhTFuL KINg and save everyone’s day!
Is that a spoiler? I don’t think that’s a spoiler. If you didn’t expect that to be the story, send me the address of the rock you’re living under so I can… decorate it…

Aquaman is one of those BIG, GLITTERY films that has big cheesy moments and lots and lotsa stuff to see. I mean… this film is PRETTY AS. The DCEU films all this while have been all CGI! Special Effects! LOTS OF DISTRACTING DETAILS ON EVERYTHING EXCEPT STEPPEN-SPRITE! BIG CGI WTF IS THATS! And this film just looks PRETTY AS. The CGI and all in this one just look… cleaner?

Yup. That’s what I’m going with. This is one CLEAN-looking film. I don’t know how good it’s going to look on DVD or other home media-things, but it looked great at the cinema. And I liked how so much of it was bright and colourful and not just DEPRESSING GRAY-BLUE or ACTION-RED like the rest of the series.

There are a LOT of delicious fishies to look at too.
And there’s a LOT of… nice things that made me… “happy“…
Sights? 9/10 deffo.

The sounds? I dunno. I didn’t think they were anything to write nest about.
4/10 I guess.

And the funny-bunny bits in this one actually… work…? Some of the jokes and such in this one are just so DUMB and dad-jokey that I had no choice but to LOL along with everyone else. They’re not really all that LOL-worthy, but they’re alright I guess. Hey! This is Aquaman. What’re we expecting?

Like I said, the story’s something we’ve heard before. We’ve got a bad guy who kinda sorta knows the hero. He’s okay. He’s not really even a bad guy, but then the film just wants him to seem like the absolute WORST. And I don’t know if whoever was coming up with what he’s supposed to be doing or saying was having a few bad days at the studio. The guy’s (Patrick Wilson) alright I guess, but I wasn’t so sure what he was supposed to be about half the time. I get what they’re doing with him. He just comes off like he’s bipolar.

Now… chattering about villains… let’s talk about BLACK MANTA (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II). NOW we’re talkin! This guy looks so f–in ODD, but he’s SO COOL! I was thinking about Mudd from Star Trek Discovery when I first saw him in the trailers and all and was thinking he’d be a “meh” badguy. But no. NO NO NO! He’s so damn rad!

And then the film goes and chucks him into a bin.
(No… wait. He actually gets chucked off something…).

🔱(ಠ ︿ ಠ^✿)

NOT COOL. ^{I need my action men dammit!}

The action’s a bit all over the place and we get some Taken-style HERE’S SOME RANDOM THINGS YOU CAN’T REALLY SEE BUT THEY’RE TOTALLY DOING COOL STUFF PROMISE! bits. But it’s not that annoying. You can kinda still see most of what’s going on and I’m OK with that.

Mera (Amber Heard)’s… Mera’s bae. Damn is she awesome! I’m going to go ahead and ban the Crow from ever watching this film because (I need to start making a list…) I mean… this film has some PRETTY people in it and they’re all for ME.

(And then Green Goblin-face’s just kinda… there.)

Aquaman!

So yeah… I kinda liked this one. It’s dumb but it knows it’s dumb. The story’s pretty meh and it’s the same old yarn-a-doodle done ALL over again. But it’s the DCEU. At least they did a meh story without f–ing it up. So that’s cool…?

Jason (marry me!) Momoa’s just ballsing around having fun in this one and Amber Heard’s having fun too. I liked that bit of the film. They really did a good bit of business with their roles and I totally bought their simple little love story.

I bet this is the Aquaman film that Aquaman fans (do they exist?) wanted. This one’s deffo for them. If I was a fan of a superhero who really shouldn’t be popular, THIS is what I’d want from the film about him.

It’s not a “good-good“ film though. The story doesn’t know what it’s trying to be. It chucks its best villain into a bin. And the MAIN VILLAIN is a few pennies short, then a few pennies more than a pound. It’s fun though. And I’m going to ignore the whole ups and downs the story has just because I’ve given the DCEU enough sh– already. I’m going to switch everything off and just let my little old self enjoy this big dumb cheesefest. The film could’ve done a bit more digging at the DCEU, but of course they didn’t really go there (but I thought they would!).

I’m going to go and recommend it as a fun few hours on a weekend. It won’t make you think about it later, but it won’t really feel like a waste of time neither. And it’s got some REALLY nice things (and lotsa actual delicious fishies)… to look at on top.

Aquaman is supposed to be out tomorrow night, but you can watch it in cinemas already. Go have fun if you’ve got two hours to murder.

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Final Ratings

THE A-W MAGPIE: 5.5 Delicious Fishies ^{+Hot people bonus!}/10
THE “SECRET SOMEONE”: 6/10
THE CROW: TBD BANNED/10

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Here’s the official poster: