For director James Wan, one of the highlights of helming the follow-up to the box office smash “Aquaman,” DC’s highest worldwide grossing film of all time, was getting back to work with the creatives, cast and crew that helped make the first film such a success.
Says Wan, “I was thrilled to return to the family of “Aquaman,” the cast who made these characters so memorable and compelling – Jason [Momoa], Patrick [Wilson], Amber [Heard], Yahya [Abdul-Mateen II] and Nicole [Kidman], alongside our full ensemble – and the creative team who helped build such a striking, unforgettable world. But now, the stakes are much higher and that world is much larger.”
Besides seeing the “Aquaman” family that many have grown to love from the first film, fans can look forward to new worlds in the sequel. “James Wan has an incredible ability to capture the colors and the fantasy that exist in these never-before-seen worlds,” says producer Peter Safran. “I think they are going to be thrilled when they see how different this film looks and feels, while still anchored in all the things they loved from the first movie, dialled up in a way that feels fresh and new.”
Case in point? “James embraced the retro sci-fi look of the Silver Age comics – what, in the ‘50s, they thought the future would look like, we’ve taken and given a modern spin and twist,” teases Safran. “You see this in the ancient Atlantean technology, in the uniforms and weaponry of Manta’s crew, his colossal sub, the one-man Octobots… James really leans in to the look and again, shows us something we’ve never seen. It’s evocative of a certain age, but wholly modern as well.”
Wan’s and Safran’s fellow producer Rob Cowan underscores the epic scale of the sequel. “We were incredibly lucky on ‘Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom,’ being able to continue the story we began in a film that the world embraced,” says Cowan. “And on the page, we really had a super-sized project, pulling out all the stops, making everything as big as we could, charting a journey as varying and different as possible through multiple worlds we were visiting for the first time… This film really is something you need to experience inside a big theater with a huge screen… because there’s just so much to look at.”
In “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom,” Black Manta (Yahya Abdul-Mateen II), having failed to defeat Aquaman (Jason Momoa) the first time and still driven by the need to avenge his father’s death, will stop at nothing to take Aquaman down once and for all. This time Black Manta is more formidable than ever before, wielding the power of the mythic Black Trident, which unleashes an ancient and malevolent force. To defeat him, Aquaman will turn to his imprisoned brother Orm (Patrick Wilson), the former King of Atlantis, to forge an unlikely alliance. Together, they must set aside their differences in order to protect their kingdom and save Aquaman’s family, and the world, from irreversible destruction.
Also starring Amber Heard, Nicole Kidman, Dolph Lundren and Randall Park, “Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom” opens exclusively in cinemas December 20.
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