Go See Aquaman , a Movie That Has Everything
You know how when you're, like, 14 and everyone except your crush and your bully is like, Please don't look at me ever, I am hideous? And then you hit your twenties and it's like, Whoa, everyone is hot now? That's Aquaman in a nutshell. I don't have to belabor the point any further: The joke about Aquaman has always been that he is the Chess Club of superheroes, with a hook so weak that real-life swimmers like Mark Spitz and Michael Phelps have more marketing power.
Aquaman's superpower is that it doesn't care what you think, now or ever. It blazes through everything you need to know—Arthur Curry is the son of a lighthouse keeper and a queen of Atlantis, he likes booze and hates pirates, and he's kind of a powerhouse—and then just takes you on a trip. And I'm not kidding: This movie has everything. Here is a list of things Aquaman has:
A prologue that prominently features an awkward teen golden retriever
Men sporting sleek aquatic French braids
A Julie Andrews cameo unlike any other
Romance! (But not with crab people, sadly)
Crazy battles! (With the crab people, incredibly)
Patrick Wilson, a man so secure in his handsomeness that he attempts to top Eddie Redmayne's performance in Jupiter Ascending while wearing a starfish helmet
Dramatic zooms on Jason Momoa looking dead at the camera
Some real Indiana Jones shit with temples and riddles and more exotic locales than a Bond flick
Fuckin' DINOSAURS
This Pitbull song:
That's not even half of the delights on display in Aquaman, a movie that seemingly had infinite money to spend on computer animation and the talent to make it look truly beautiful, with wonderfully shot action sequences and actors who are having the time of their lives even as they deliver hilariously bad lines. It's not a movie that's narratively clever by any means, but it is a movie that will astound you with the sheer number of audacious and ridiculous things director James Wan and the team he's assembled have all managed to pull off. The joy of watching it comes from seeing all the unbelievable stuff in it, and then watching other people take it all in for the first time. It's also the film's weakness: It's so eager to show you all this stuff that you barely have any time to take it in and really care about anything other than the ride. But hey, when you're riding a damn shark into war and there's an octopus playing drums and also Nicole Kidman is there? I wouldn't say no.
