Aquaman
Good DC film. Who would have thought?
After the utter garbage fire that was Batman V superman, Suicide squad, a film that mystically gets worse each time you see it with no apparent rock-bottom and Wonder woman which was great for two thirds of its run time then shat the bed spectacularly with its final act I had almost given up on DC... Then this happened.
So whats changed?
Well they hired James Wan who actually seems to know how to string together a coherent narrative. He recognises what sort of film he's being asked to make and embraces it. One of the big problems DC had was Zach Snyder. An impressive visual stylist he should really stick with music videos because as a director of feature length motion pictures he's worthless. The attempt to shoe-horn in the philosophy of Ayn Rand didn't help. The films that followed were lumbered with trying to fit into his 'vison'.
Wan seems to have decided 'f*** that' and abandoned the Snyderisms that mistake teen angst for depth and goes full 'flash gordon' embracing the general silliness of the concept and focusing on telling a decent story with entertaining action beats. Nice to see Dolph Lundgren getting a big role here as well. Given we just saw the best performance he has ever given in Creed 2 he's having a good year. Extra credits to Patrick Wilson as the villain who seems to be channelling Julian Sands.
The film seems to be a big success. DC should pay Wan mega bucks to come on board and tell Snyder not to bother coming back to work. He can sod off and make his Atlas Shrugged dream project. If DC makes more films like this Marvel might have some competition.
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