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Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom Movie Review

Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom is a 2023 superhero film directed by James Wan and starring Jason Momoa and Patrick Wilson. It’s supposedly the last DCEU movie and a very disappointing one at that.

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“Do not call me brother!“

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Black Manta seeks revenge on Aquaman for his father’s death. Wielding the Black Trident’s power, he becomes a formidable foe. To defend Atlantis, Aquaman forges an alliance with his imprisoned brother. They must protect the kingdom. The first ‘Aquaman’ movie was a delight and it still remains one of the best DCEU films. It benefitted from great creativity and genre thrills from the always reliable James Wan. Imagine my disappointment, then, that its sequel turned out to be such a letdown.

Gone are the charm and highly adventurous tone of the original in favor of more bombastic action set pieces and a chaotic pace and terrible structure. The editing on this movie is truly horrendous. There are so many scenes that are hastily cut and so many silly plot points and way too many action, thus making for a far from engaging watch. But said action is at times thrilling and amusingly kinetic, so at least the movie had that.

The movie seemed to be going from one set piece to another with no solid transitions present at all. The plot is quite mediocre overall and nowhere near as engaging or as adventurous as its predecessor. Amber Heard wasn’t dropped due to her controversies, but her screen time was still significantly reduced to the point that she was entirely unimportant. All female characters here had no purpose and Black Manta was also a rather uninteresting villain.

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With that being said, there is one thing that Aquaman 2 does well and that is its humor. Jason Momoa has rarely been better than he was here as he was so energetic and charismatic. Even better was Patrick Wilson, who was so amusing and funny, especially on the land scenes. The two shared genuinely electric chemistry, that resulted in such a fun brotherly dynamic that made this movie very charming during their shared moments together. The visuals are just as colorful as before and there is a lot of crazy James Wan horror-influenced imagery throughout, but I needed way more underwater scenes in a film about a superhero called Aquaman.