When it comes to Hollywood’s superhero franchises, it’s often the case that a big-name character from one movie will appear in another so as to bring the universe closer together. And so, you have Tony Stark’s Iron Man making an appearance in Spider-Man: Homecoming and Wonder Woman coming between Batman and Superman during Dawn of Justice.
For Aquaman, though, director James Wan ventured down the road less traveled; rather than overload his superhero spinoff with fan service and DC cameos, he allowed Arthur Curry to stand on his own two feet, otherwise the likes of Batman, Superman and Wonder Woman would’ve stolen some of Jason Momoa’s thunder.
Via The Huffington Post:
I just feel like this is his stand-alone movie, just let it be about Aquaman. I feel like all the other characters have had so many movies; audiences have known all the other characters in all the other movies, all these different projects. Let this be Aquaman’s time in the spotlight.
And you can’t fault Wan’s reasoning. This is, after all, the first time Jason Momoa’s Arthur Curry has been given free rein, so it would have been a shame if his first solo outing was overshadowed by a super-secret cameo appearance that ultimately stole more headlines than Aquaman himself. Thankfully, that wasn’t the case, and it’s fair to say that a small part of the pic’s success can be attributed to Zack Snyder, who gave Wan his blessing early on in the production phase.
So when he told me that was his idea. I was like, ‘Oh great, then I can actually have Arthur go to Atlantis for the first time.’ That’s very important for me, because he can go into it and have a wide-eyed approach to Atlantis and be in awe of it. I think that’s very important from a storytelling standpoint because the audience gets to experience Atlantis for the first time along with the character.
At $940 million and counting, Aquaman is expected to break the $1 billion threshold sometime this week, placing it in the company of true box office royalty.
