Aquaman Blu-ray review: The latest in a long line of DC superheroes gets the stand-alone movie treatment with a lengthy, visually impressive feature with fan-fave Jason Momoa as Arthur Curry.
The film opens in the past, 1985 Maine to be exact, where a young, single man, Thomas Curry (a de-aged Temuera Morrison) seen rescuing a woman who has been washed up outside his working lighthouse. The woman is Atlanna (Nicole Kidman), who is revealed to be the queen of the underwater nation of Atlantis. The two fall in love and have a young child together, Arthur Curry (Momoa), who shares his mother’s ability to speak with underwater lifeforms. After a visit from a team of hostiles from Atlantis, Atlanna is forced to return back home, leaving Thomas to raise their beloved son on his own.
Deep underwater, King Orm (Patrick Wilson) now rules Atlantis and with his immense army, plans to not only dominate his own territory, but invade the world that lies above the surface. Arthur Curry, now a fully-grown man, and now branded Aquaman by the daily news reports, is the only thing that stands in his way. He must head for the world he had discarded, to pursue the legendary Trident of Atlan to fulfil his destiny and stop the tirade of his villainous half-brother.
The scale of James Wan’s largest film to date is huge, and it is very, very impressive from the outset. The success of Wonder Woman puts immense extra pressure on the movie to perform – and as this is a home entertainment review – we now know that it did just that on its theatrical release – $1.1 billion and counting – DC and Warner Bros’ highest earner to date. It clearly struck a cord with audiences, and its easy to see why. It’s biggest asset, quite literally is Momoa who is perfect in the title role. His charm and charisma come through in his excellent performance and he’s totally watchable and believable (if that’s possible) in every single way.
Clearly, a lot has gone into the bringing the character to the screen in this movie– something cemented by the tremendous array of bonus, behind-the-scenes material on the home release. There are a series of featurettes, all of which run from 3 minutes up to 20 minutes in length. From the likes of ‘James Wan: World Builder’ to ‘Becoming Aquaman’, through to the stand-out feature, ‘Going Deep Into The World Of Aquaman’, everything included on the release has been delivered with massive attention to detail. There are a few shorter featurettes that look at the likes of the weapons used in the film, the heroines featured in the film, a look at the training that each of the actors went through to prepare for their roles. There are tons more and even a look at the now-playing Shazam! Quite simply one of the best DC Blu-ray releases we’ve seen so far.
The HD picture quality on the Blu-ray is top notch, as it the sound – both of which you’d expect, and it absolutely was a delight to put through the home system.
The film itself might struggle to tick everyone’s boxes – it really is one for the more ardent superhero movie fans – and it is very long, but it’s hard to argue against this being one of the DC universes finest hours so far.
Aquaman is now available on 4K Ultra HD, 3D Blu-ray, Blu-ray and DVD.
