Movie Review - Aquaman

MegaSoulhero (Cries in corner) So... I just saw Aquaman. The newest DC movie. For a long time, I’ve been saying that giving Aquaman his own movie was a stupid idea. Yet, they still have him one. I wasn’t excited for this film at all. Not only did the trailers look bad, but DC’s more recent movies haven’t been all that great. With the exception of Wonder Woman of course. However, people have been saying that Aquaman is a good movie. So that got me a little more interested in seeing it. So I did see it and...

IT WAS ABSOLUTELY UNBEARABLE!!!!!

If you saw Black Panther, you already know the plot. Aquaman needs to prove himself to be a true king. He goes on a search for a trident with the help of a woman named Mera. Anyway, this is usually the part where I talk about the positives in the film, but I’m skipping that part because there aren’t any good things to say about it. EVERYTHING in this movie is awful! It is unbelievable that this somehow got greenlit! It’s the worst DC film since Green Lantern! In the very first action scene that Aquaman has in the film, it tells us exactly what kind of movie this will be. It is SO poorly edited! What is with the constant use of slow motion? It’s use more than it should be in the film! It doesn’t look cool at all! The movie tries too hard to make Aquaman seem like a cool character since he’s been seen as a joke for years. They do it to the point where they’re trying to shove it in our faces. Aquaman acts too much like a tough guy and Mamoa’s performance doesn’t seem real at all! None of the performances seem real! Most of the characters say their lines with uninterested expressions on their faces. This was ESPECIALLY noticeable every time Amber Heard was speaking. Throughout the movie, it looked like she was reading from cue cards. If the actors don’t care, why should the audience?

The dialogue is absolutely horrendous! They try to throw in a joke every chance they get! None of the jokes are even funny! Some of them don’t even make sense! Like there’s a scene where a little girl gives Mera a Pinocchio book. That part was set up by an earlier scene where Aquaman uses his knowledge of Pinocchio to escape, but why did the girl just randomly give Mera a Pinocchio book!? By the way, the relationship between Aquaman and Mera feels very forced. I felt zero chemistry between the two. Also, the movie stops telling its story for a little bit so we can have a montage of them hanging out in Italy. There’s actually quite a few scenes that ruin the pacing of the film. It constantly cuts to flashbacks of Aquaman training with Willem Dafoe, but these flashbacks make the film feel very unorganized. Black Manta is in the movie. I was actually very excited to see him because he’s a pretty cool villain. Unfortunately, he’s not in it for very long. He was only there to set up a sequel. I was very angered by that. Why bother going through the trouble of showing him making his suit and preparing to fight Aquaman and only have him fight Aquaman in the middle of the film? If they just wanted to set up Black Manta, they shouldn’t have actually shown him become Black Manta in this movie. They should’ve waited until the next movie to do that. It would’ve made so much more since to have them hunt at him being Black Manta in a post credits scene. But no, we gotta have a little scene with him making his suit while hip hop music is going on in the background. Yeah, that made him seem much less intimidating.

As for the CGI, it’s some of the worst I’ve seen in a modern film. There isn’t a single shot that I thought looked appealing to look at! I watched this in IMAX and I couldn’t stop thinking about how awful the visuals were! All I could think about was these actors hanging from wires in front of a green screen, pretending to swim! Some of these effects were so bad that I literally laughed. Since they’re underwater, their hair constantly moves and the CGI for that was so painfully noticeable! There’s also this one shot that straight up looked like something out of an animated movie! I was getting some serious Attack of the Clones vibes! The worst part is, CGI is used CONSTANTLY throughout the film! I know they kinda have to use CGI to make it work, but this is 2 hours and 20 minutes of awful, and I mean AWFUL CGI! Which ends up being a MAJOR problem in the climax! It’s one of the worst looking climaxes ever! It was just one big CGI-fest! It’s like someone just threw in literally anything onto the screen just to keep people’s attention! Like someone jingling keys in front of a baby’s face to keep them entertained! Because let me tell you, this movie has too many action scenes. That wouldn’t normally be a problem, but it doesn’t allow for the characters to get any development. And when there’s action happening, it’s hard to tell what’s going on because they try to throw in as much CGI as possible to the point where it looks like an absolute mess!

It’s pretty obvious that I hate this movie. Sitting through this trainwreck was such an awful experience for me! I knew this movie would be bad, but I didn’t expect it to be THIS bad! It should be banned from existence! It should be removed from theaters! It should not be viewed by ANYONE! This is an absolutely horrible movie with no redeeming qualities! DO NOT SEE AQUAMAN!!!

Score: 0/10

Comments

...And I who was very anticipated for it. I loved Wonder Woman and Justice League, but your points makes me lose faith in the movie - visitor

Oof - iliekpiez

I like James Wan's visual style. And the vibrant colours were pretty cool to look at. Much better than Snyder's ugly-looking movies.
The CGI could have been better but it wasn't worse than Black Panther. And BP is apparently in Academy's list for Best VFX. what

And Mera is miscast,in my opinion. Amber Heard can't act and she's the main reason the romance feels so forced. - Tia-Harribel

I mean, it wasn't good and had some horrid jokes and poor CGI but I don't think it's a 0/10 for me. - AlphaQ

It was alright - iliekpiez