I could write a simple, one sentence review of
Aquaman that conveys the quality of the film:
It's another D.C. movie. Since I've never missed an opportunity to run on when being concise would work, here's a bit more long-winded take. I wanted to like the movie, I truly did. I have no particular feeling, positive or negative, for the character; my only real experience with the dude is watching
SuperFriends and the recent
Justice League movie. Based on Aquaman's role in
Justice League, I assumed this movie would be two hours of Jason Mamoa wise-cracking like a roided-out, underwater Jerry Seinfeld. It was that and so much more. And by more, I mean less.
Mamoa, you know, the guy who in every role somehow looks like he always smells while also constantly looking like he is starring in a shampoo commercial, does try hard. He seems like a decent actor deserving of a movie better than this, but he and the rest of the cast are dealing with a dog turd of a script. The dialogue stinks like day old sushi. Nicole Kidman, phoning it in as A-man's mer-queen mom, hasn't tread a plot this thin since
Days of Thunder. Actually, this flick makes
Days look like an Oscar winner.
The short version goes something like this: forced to save his mom's hometown of Atlantis, Aquaman heads out on a Homeric odyssey to recover an ancient king's
magic fork trident. What little plot there is exists only to move you to the next action scene. Unfortunately, the action is cheesier than the dialogue. Remember the scene in
The Phantom Menace where Obi-Wan, Qui Gon, and Jar-Jar pilot the little submarine through the underwater passages of Naboo? Of course you don't; the scene was boring, terrible and forgettable. If you did recall, you'd remember it was ten minutes of Jedis coughing out shitty one-liners and Jar-Jar shrieking while navigating waters populated by silly alien sea creatures. Well, about half of
Aquaman is that scene played out in different ways. Aquaman rides, surfs, and fights every manner of video game sea creature and cartoonish crustacean you can think of. I was surprised Sebastian and Flounder didn't show up for a musical number. The rest of the movie feels familiar, too. Not in a good way. It has vibes of Power Rangers, echoes of Flash Gordon, hints of
Under Siege and feels like a rip off of, not Indiana Jones, but Indiana Jones ripoffs like
National Treasure and
The Mummy.
To distract from this, the producers tossed in plenty of substandard special effects, bright colors, and flashing lights like the movie is actually some sort of underwater game show. Throw in two poorly drawn villains, heavy-handed environmentalism, Dolph Lundgren, and Dolph-ins and you've got a mess. I don't want to say I disliked the movie, but I felt like
I spent the evening stuck in a plastic six-pack ring. D.C. super hero movies act as if a thundering, soaring score and raspy voiced hero can convince you that having poo dumped in your lap for two hours is epic. But, you know what, I could be wrong. Remarkably, when the credits rolled the theater erupted in cheers and applause. And not like people were happy to have finally escaped their worst ever visit to the aquarium. They were genuine cheers. With those folks, I will happily disagree. This movie gets 2.5 tuna cans out of ten from me.
